After recovering from paddling from Varen to St Antonin we decided to continue our travels onwards to Bruniquel. The distance is similar so we anticipated another six hour stretch of paddling. We arrived in St Antonin to the busy hordes visiting the Sunday market and parked next to the river amongst the camping cars.
As this was our fourth trip we were well practised in sorting ourselves out and the canoe was inflated and ready to go in short order. We received a number of passing comments from some purveyors of the English language who were picnicking on the river bank, all positive, so we joined in asking if they had some champagne to help launch our canoe. So with laughs all round we jumped in and paddled off joining various other canoeists along to the first weir.The first picture is of a family out canoeing. I managed to time the shot so their faces were not obscured by their paddles and I really like the way the water droplets catch the light coming off the boy's paddle.
We saw plenty of grey herons along the route but they would fly off as soon as we, or other canoeists got too close. To get this picture of the heron we steered the canoe so we remained hidden behind a huge boulder in the middle of the river. The water was clear enough so that we could see the fish he was hoping to catch, maybe next time we will bring some fishing tackle but I am not sure I could stand the tedium.
Coming down some rapids we caught a view of Penne Castle perched on its craggy outcrop high above the river, but I had only packed my telephoto lens and I could not capture the scene of the medieval castle, village and the river, so we stopped the canoe and I waded back upstream in bare feet ouch! as I had also not packed my canoe boots, sometimes I do wonder about myself.
In case there are any readers that might be chasseurs, I am not going to disclose where I took the picture of the young deer. It was getting dark as the weather had turned from sunny to very cloudy but I heard a noise to my right - water is such a good conductor of sound - and looked across and saw a young deer munching on leaves on the edge of the river. It looked at us and did not seem to be too perturbed so after a couple of snaps we quietly glided past leaving it to its repas.
Nev
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