May 2, 2025, Vézelay, France
The pilgrimage begins
We left Albuquerque on Monday morning, April 28, to find our flight to Dallas delayed by hours. We left that afternoon, spent the night in a hotel in a Dallas suburb and most of the next day at DFW before flying overnight to Paris, arriving on April 30.
I will attempt to copy my Facebook posts here. Writing on my iPhone Mini is difficult and today is the first we’ve had a little breathing space.
Going backwards
Our flight from ABQ to Dallas was delayed from about 1 pm to 8:30 pm. So here we are. Home for lunch in the patio, said goodbye to the roses again, and back to the airport for a 4:40 pm flight. Unless the plane to Paris is incredibly delayed, too, we will arrive a day late. The deadline just passed to cancel our Paris hotel without penalty. We may be spending 24 hours in DFW.😒
Morning, May 30. Paris
Hurrah! We’ve arrived at our hotel in Paris! Here’s the view from our window in the 13th. We had the usual queues and way finding difficulties and unbearable seats—can they possibly make them any smaller? It is quite warm here — upper 70s. Tomorrow we take the train to Vezelay.
Evening. May 30, Paris
After a very short rest (Kent totally conked out) we decided to walk 4 km each way to Notre Dame and back. It was 80 degrees F, but we stood in the long queue to get in. Seems like it is not true you can get a pilgrim credential there, but we spent quite a bit of time. Then we took &a different route back, stopping twice for drinks and a light supper. I can hardly stay awake to type this, so here are a very few photos. To Vézelay by train tomorrow before 1 pm if we slept on the 9-hour overnight flight, it was only for a few minutes. Lovely to be back in Paris!
May 1, Vézelay
We walked through Paris to Le Gare de Bercy,had a lovely train ride and then a very hot walk 9 plus km from Sermizelles to Vézelay. It took us from 3 until 7 pm., with one short stop for beer at the only place we came to in Asquins. We had a warm welcome at the St. Madeleine Centre, and we were exceedingly hot.
It is a busy long weekend starting today with May Day, so we will be here two nights. and we will walk only 12 km on Saturday. No room at that distance tomorrow. By the time we got into our dorm room — the restaurants were closing, and there were not many of them. Thanks to the English-speaking priest who carried both of our packs 3 floors up curved old stairs.
We did find a most interesting place run single-handedly by an innovative chef, but that’s too long to tell here now! Plus it is already 11 pm. and past lights out! We’re both in the women’s dorm as the men’s is pretty much full.
Thanks to daughter Psyche for managing to set up a Verizon wireless month-long travel plan for me as WiFi has been hard to come by and I couldn’t even connect with them through WiFi because I couldn’t receive text messages.
If anyone want’s to reach Kent in the next couple of days, contact me.
May 2 much Needed rest day in Vézelay
We are taking it easy, washing our clothes viewing the Basilica, having a leisurely lunch, getting money from a well-hidden ATM, impromptu concert, practicing my French, taking an afternoon nap. We’ll be ready to go early tomorrow morning! 11 k to Domecy sur Cure. Should be fairly short walk in cooler weather —maybe rain!
Caminobleu 