Where’s That Damn Waterfall?!

I mentioned in my post about our visit to Lac d’Estaing that Xander and I had a bit of an adventure looking for some waterfalls.  Now that some time has passed I can see it for the funny thing that it is and can tell the story with much less swearing.

While we were at the lake, we stopped to get an ice cream and I saw this postcard…

They look pretty nice, right?  I really wanted to find out where the waterfalls were so I could get some photos.  I asked the guy who worked in the shop where we could find them and he said, AND I QUOTE:

You drive to the end of the road and it’s just a short walk from there.  It’s not far at all.

Ok, that sounded like something that might be fun!  We hopped in the car and headed towards the end of the valley.

When we got out of the car I was looking up at the hill, you can’t see it in this photo but there were people walking along a path way up the hill. They were so small they looked like ants!  I thought to myself that they must be going somewhere else, somewhere past the waterfall.  I hoped to myself that they were going somewhere else because we weren’t at all prepared for a hike, with only sandals on and one small bottle of water.

You can already see where this is going, can’t you?

It was clear from the start how this was going to go, with Xander being a lot more fit than I was it turned out to be a series of him walking ahead and then stopping to wait for me to catch up.  I huffed and climbed, trying not to worry too much about it as I was convinced that the waterfall was right around the corner.

Nope, all that was around the corner was a nice view back towards the lake.  Oh, and this really nice little mountain shack. I wondered if anyone lived there but we didn’t see anyone around.

We could see a little stream, so where there’s water there must be  a waterfall!  It must be up around the next corner then.

Yeah, not so much… all that was around the corner was a wider path that kept climbing steadily upwards, that is also not as visible on the photo but it was a definite incline.  By this time I was starting to wonder if we were about to become some of those tiny little ants I saw from down at the road.

Before long the little mountain shack was long behind and the waterfall was still nowhere in sight.  Maybe I was just tired but the distances seemed much greater than what it appears to be in the photo.  It was far though, we had been walking for quite a long time at this point.  Surely we had to be close, but there was no end in sight!

Before long neither the shack nor the lake could be seen when I looked back.  WHERE IN THE HELL IS THAT WATERFALL?!!

The entire time this little stream was trickling along beside us.  I wondered, if this is coming from these roaring waterfalls, why does it not seem a little more… rapid?  There was still a long stretch of path ahead of us though and I didn’t think we were ever going to find it.  It was a myth, I was convinced.

The problem was that we’d already gone that far, I couldn’t turn back!  Even though I was fed up with walking on that rocky path with totally inappropriate footwear, I was red as a beet, sweating and getting slightly sunburned… I had to know. I HAD TO SEE where that damn waterfall was!

Thank goodness there was some beautiful scenery along the way!

Then… this happened.

This is starting to look like what should be at the base of the waterfall, look at the sticks and debris… there was some serious water flowing along there.  Notice I said WAS??  Yeah, because there wasn’t anymore!

After hours walking and climbing in our stupid sandals, having long run out of water, THIS is what was waiting for us.  A water trickle.

MOTHER FUCKER!!!!! *echo* Mother fucker…mother fucker…mother fucker *echo*
Yeah, I screamed.  I’m pretty sure hikers all over the Pyrenees heard my cries.

Well, I screamed as well as I was able to while I gasped for breath.

You know those soccer player dudes who crashed in the mountains and had to eat the muscles out of the asses of their dead friends?  That’s pretty much what I imagined my evening to be like, because by this time I was done.  I was just completely and utterly finished. I was going to be stranded in this mountain forever…   After all that, we then had to turn around and walk all the way back down.

We had spent the entire day on this and other than burning a few calories, the photos and chatting along the way, we had nothing to show for it.

I was never so happy as when I turned that corner and saw our car.  Seriously, I was about two steps from having someone call a helicopter to rescue me.

If I had more energy left I would have gone back to that shop and punched that guy in the throat.  Instead we went back to our campground, ordered some dinner from the canteen and booked ourselves an hour in the whirlpool hot tub to rest our aching muscles, it was wonderful!

One day I’m going to go back there and see those waterfalls when they are actually falling.   I have to, it’s like we went to war and the mountain won, I must get my revenge.