From Perpignan we turned boldly into the cleft road through the valley of the Têt, via Prades and Mont Louis to Bourg-Madame, the frontier town toward Spain, and the only decent route for entering Spain by automobile via the Mediterranean gateway.
Bourg-Madame is marked on most maps, but it is all but unknown of itself; no one thinks of going there unless he be touring the Pyrenees, or visiting Andorra, one of the unspoiled corners of Europe, as quaint and unworldly to-day as it ever was; a tiny republic of very, very few square kilometres, whose largest city or town, or whatever you choose to call it, has but five hundred inhabitants.
If one is swinging round the Pyrenean circle he goes on to Porte, where, at the Auberge Michette, he will learn all that is needful for penetrating into the unknown darkest spot in Europe. We thought to do the journey "en auto," but on arrival at Porte learned it was not to be thought of. A sure-footed little Pyrenean donkey or mule was the only pathfinder used to the twistings and turnings and blind paths of this little mountain republic, where the people speak Spanish, and religion and law are administrated by the French and Spanish authorities in turn.
It's a week's travel properly to visit Andorra and view all its wild unworldliness, so the trip is here only suggested.
We took up our route again, crossing the Col de Puymorans (1,781 metres), and dropped down on Hospitalet, which also is printed in large black letters on the maps, but which contains only 148 inhabitants, unless there have been some births and no deaths since this was written.
From Hospitalet we were going down, down, down all of the time, the valley road of the Ariége, dropping with remarkable precipitation.
In eighteen kilometres we were at Aix-les-Thermes. The guide-books call it "une jolie petite ville," and no one will dispute it, though it had no charms for us; we were more interested in routes and roads than in mere watering-places, and so, beyond a stop for gasoline for the motor, not having been able to get any for the last fifty kilometres, still following the valley of the Ariége, we arrived at Foix for lunch, at the most excellent Hôtel Benoit, just as the ice was being brought on the table and the hors d'œuvres were being portioned out.
Taken all in all, Foix was one of the most delightful towns we found in all the Pyrenean itinerary. It is quite the most daintily and picturesquely environed town imaginable, its triple-towered château and its rocher looming high above all, and sounding a dominant note which carries one back to the days when Gaston Phoebus was the seigneur of Foix.
We planned to spend the night at the Hôtel de France at St. Girons, for it was marked down in the Guide-Michelin as being fitted with those modern refinements of travel which most of us appreciate, and there was furthermore a garage and a fosse, or inspection pit. We had need of the latter, for something was going wrong beneath the body of our machine which manifestly require being attended to without delay.