Once again, we had a late morning, between sleeping in and talking with Valérie (our host), and a relaxed afternoon, this time mostly in the city gardens. Around the end of the afternoon we went to a bar near Sophie’s place (our host of the first night). She was coming back from her week-end around the end of the afternoon, and Loïc had left his backpack there.
But I ended up going to the bar alone: Loïc decided instead to go to the hospital to get his ankle checked. He (and I mean we) should have thought of that on the first day already but well. After, I went at Sophie’s and we talked for a while until Loïc got back with a tendinitis diagnostic. So short of stopping our trip, nothing to do, really, except strapping the ankle and not pushing it too hard. Later, Sophie drove us to another couchsurfer’s place, Julien, who was willing to host us for the night.
They REALLY like making puns.
That day was challenging for me. I kept having mood swings and wasn’t sure what I wanted to do regarding the trip. The previous days, Loïc could walk kind of fine during the mornings, but his ankle was always causing trouble around midday. In the afternoon, all he could do was walk at a very measured pace and it doesn’t seem like he enjoyed it very much.
And when it became clear that this would not go away after one or two nights of sleep, I started feeling that this was not something I could do with for a long time: it was not funny knowing and seeing him in pain, but it was also starting to be annoying for me to have to wait for him each afternoon. And obviously, it was even less enjoyable for him.
So I wasn’t sure what was the best course of action: keep going, splitting up, quitting? I kept hesitating, moving from one mindset to the other… With hindsight, the gray weather and the lack of activity compared to the previous days also had a bad effect on my mood. In the end, I chose to continue at least until the mountains. If by then he was still hurt, we would have to find a plan B in any case.