Andorra-Pas de la Casa-Canillo..

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The bus up to Pas de la Casa was not your average bus journey into Manchester, or was it? Well Manchester isn't duty free, so motivation was a key difference. One doesn't carry an empty rucksack and a passport to pick up a halter-neck top from Chelsea Girl! (Though you can pick up duty-free cigarettes and tobacco from most Manchester pubs - try Burnage for good Dutch rolling).
At the border a suitably officious looking Customs officer climbed on board, setting off a wave of rummaging for passports, particularly irritating for me whose passport was secreted away in a-I couldn't remember which- hidden compartment of my rucksack. It had to be hauled in and out of the corridor to let the officer on and the various (though I want to say nefarious) individuals off the bus, to catch up on their slow conversion into cardiovascular disease, lung cancer, and emphysema,  patients, that they looked like extras from a Howard Hawks film we'll put down to my, still to be tweaked by the mountain, imagination. 
No-one was arrested. We arrived in the capital.
The photo above can't convey the feelings that were evoked in me by it.  That is photography's shortcoming. That's why writing is such a perfect compliment to it. Have I changed the subject yet? No! Damn! 
"Let not women's weapons, water-drops stain my man's cheeks!" King Lear.
Don't go near mountains then Lear! 
Mountains should be classified as a class A drug. They have the power to remove the pattern of conformity that society demands of each of us and at the same time reinforce it: Up the mountain the paradox is realised. (Read the book for the elongated version of this: "J'arrive: Sobre la Cena." Gerrard Armor (Published 2043).
Behind me and opposite the chair lifts was the post office where I returned a Craghopper fleece, 5 litre kitchen sink, first aid kit and Mountainlife culottes back to my flat in Manchester. The cost of postage:17 euros, cost of goods: 17 euros, weight 1.5 kilos.
Behind the post office was a ferrot.. farroc.. feroca.. plumbers supplies shop. I popped in here to see if they had any tape for the package.  The lady in the shop was Spanish. I bought an end role of gaffer tape for 1 euro. The tears this time were ones of joy. Suppressed nevertheless, joy at noticing the woman's relief in hearing me speak Spanish and my relief at being able to speak to someone, more fluently than my knowledge of French/Catalan, Spanish/Catalan, Portuguese or French for that matter had allowed so far. Everone's familiar with that look one gets following this exchange:
" Hi are you American?" "No, Canadian!"
" Hi are you Australian?" "No, New Zealander"
" Hi are you from Brighton?" "No, Hove (actually)"
Well Andorra will lure the most able diplomat into these faux pas (plural!).

Time for a photograph and to get away from people.

This ground hugging thistle (Carlina acaulis) was named after Charlemagne,who, on his way over the Pyrenees to thump the Arabic occupiers of Spain, had his army struck with the plague.  An angel told him an arrow fired would land on the plant that could cure it.  Barbora, friend of  Martin, the Czech ornithologist I was soon to meet (and lose), told me that behind the flower head, rather like a globe artichoke is an edible disk, thus its nickname "Hunter's Bread",  The rhizome too, like a cucumber and edible, contains an antibacterial carlina oxide. 


I took a bus to Canillo, a little town still in Andorra, that would provide me with a good point to join up with the GR11 again and a good walk around to Coma Pedrosa the next mountain I'd climb. 
When I arrived I went straight to the tourist office to double check where I could find the path, it was siesta so after several milliseconds of optionizing I took refuge from the midday heat under  a parasol over a table that might be judged to be thoroughly naked if not offering support to either a glass of beer or some culinary repast deserving of a lonesome adventurer.

Ensalada con Queso de Cabra y Cerveza!!

Following this divine intervention, and forgetting about the Tourist Office, I teased myself that I couldn't get another kilo out of my rucksack and send it home, Oh couldn't I!