Sanglier sighting

Sam and I decided to walk off some of the Christmas over indulgence and walked out of the village, under the railway bridge and followed the road towards Lagarde. We had reached the furthest point that I had intended us to walk to and were about to scramble up onto the voie verte to head back to Camon when I heard yelping dogs and spied 3 camouflaged men standing in a field.

“Looks like a chasse”, I said to Sam, “They're probably hunting sanglier”

We stood in a clearing with a view of the hounds milling around a dip in the ground filled with large shrubs. I noted that surprisingly none of the 3 men were armed and suggested that it would be safe for us to walk along the path even though it bordered the field where this hunt was operating.

“What's that grey thing?” asked Sam

I turned to look and could only see a muddy looking dog

“It looks like its got a snout”, Sam continued

As she said this an enormous sanglier broke cover pursued by a rag-tag collection of hounds.

“It's a sanglier” I squealed, gripping her arm rather too tightly. I was absolutely thrilled as this was the first one I'd seen. And it was heading straight down the field towards us.

“What's that?”, asked Sam

“a wild boar”, I replied

“like Pumbaa?” she queried

“I think Pumbaa was a warthog”, I replied. Still although I'm no expert I think they are all types of wild pig.

High-speed pig (image from www.menespletnews.unblog.fr)

Meanwhile the sanglier had done an impressive 90 degree high-speed turn and disappeared into woodland at the top of the hill.

I have since worked out that our sighting was probably in the confines of the parc de chasse (hunting park) which would explain the absence of guns, nevertheless I am deeply thrilled to have seen my first sanglier.