A walk around...Martizay

To be honest our walk in Martizay last week can not really be described as around the village as, due to my "I know where I'm going" (man-thing) attitude to these trips. we ended up walking 45mins along the D78 and then back again!

Here's why...Lets start at the beginning, or not as the case may be!

The boards displaying these routes in my opinion should be at the beginning of the route with a big blue, green or yellow dot to let you know 'You are here'. One underfoot would be even better (love the footprints in Poitiers for example) blue walk starts here, yellow here etc.... Though coloured footprints all over our lovely villages is not a good idea. Just a bit of a clue.  

Now, the people who promote these walks have gone to a lot of trouble, even if there is a lack of consistency in how they are presented and duplication of effort (what ? "in France surely not" ,I hear you say) but a little updating is necessary I think. We consider ourselves as reasonably intelligent people (or is that pushing it?) but along with friends have lost the trail, or should that be plot?, on a number of occasions due to poor or non-existent signage.

 My interpretation of the plan took us out over the river Claise -looking resplendent in the spring sunshine.

I was looking for blue markers as we left the village behind us

But all we had was tarmac!

  

With some nice views either side.

After doing the march out and then back in again, having realised we were never going to find any markers, we assessed what had gone wrong, other than following my lead. 

We had failed to notice the sign hiding behind the hedge by the church 

Or the blocked lane where the walk should  have started.

It seems  we are not the only ones who have a slight difficulty with these 'marked' routes judging from Colin  & Elizabeth's blog of Sunday.