En España, Finalmente

A city we passed through whose name escapes me, frantically en route to Spain

A small, inconspicuous town, partly in Pyrénées-Orientales, a Catalan speaking region of France, and partly in Spanish Catalonia has a small sign marking the border the two nations. As we crossed over most of the signs turned to Catalan from French, not French to Spanish. The Catalan language has a much better political standing in Spain than France. Despite appreciating linguistic diversity this was somewhat of a disappointment to me in all honesty. I was looking forward to being able to read the road signs, the posters, all the small things that feel exciting when you're learning a particular language. But this would have to wait.

 I was struggling with hunger as we crossed into Spain. Shortly after the border we pulled into a bakery and I ordered some cold pizza topped with tuna and tomato in Spanish. It felt great to finally be able to use the language. Although Catalan is the traditional language of the region and is still spoken by some ten million odd people everyone speaks Spanish. Except for in a handful of isolated, traditional villages where elderly people solely speak Catalan. In one village I was surprised to be great by literally every person I met in Catalan, not Spanish.

We descended the Pyrenees by way of a gorge and before long were in La Seu D'Urgell, an important regional centre and home to a slalom course built for the Barcelona Olympics. We quickly found the course, following a series of posters and kayaks in the middle of round-a-bouts. We spent most of the day here, lying on the grass, using their WiFi and for Dan, getting familiarised with the course and finding the Australian team.

I walked to town and bought a copy of one of Spain's national papers, El Pais. The elderly woman inside was very kind and loved that I wanted to learn her language. I spent some forty minutes talking with her until I stepped back out into the heat.

That night team accommodation started for Dan and I spent my first night camping alone. I found perfect camping near an hermita, a word in Spanish that describes a small church in the countryside, often accessible solely by foot. I hiked up here the next morning and watched the crimson light enter the valley, bringing day to the cut-off villages in its depths. 

The next few days were spent in and out of Spain and the small, Pyrenees nation of Andorra, a very mountainous little piece of land.