I've been in donkey heaven

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I always pick up tourist leaflets and brochures when I get the chance and I hit pay dirt yesterday. I found a donkey farm where they milk the donkeys and make cosmetics from the milk. It also seemed that you could camp there if you had a ‘camping car’. Doris took us on a terrible road but eventually we made it. The farm earns its living from several lavender fields and from the donkey products. At 5.30pm quite a it number of people gathered for the ‘tour’. The woman explained how they extracted the oil from the lavender plants then told us all about the donkeys – except that she didn’t translate her information for us as we were the only two English-speakers. Luckily her two workers also spoke English and told us quite a bit about the project and later I googled the Pyrenees donkey. There are two types; the Catalan is taller than most donkeys that you might see and are very dark with pale muzzle, white patches round the eyes and a pale belly. They do not have dorsal marks or marks acroes their shoulders. The second smaller and sturdier type is the Gascon. The Catalan is endangered and great efforts are now being made to preserve the breed. There were 30 donkeys on the farm. Seven were being milked. Foals are shut away for 12 hours then the jennies are milked. It seemed the one we saw milked gave a couple of litres. The seven were all tied one behind the other round the perimeter of a low-roofed barn. We saw the seven youngsters who all had dried feed and hay. We camped in the car-park and paid 5 euro for electricity. We bought some rose-scented donkey soap and a cute postcard. The actual tour was free so we were happy with our day’s travels – apart for the terrible road in but that wasn’t the fault of the farm. The road out this morning was infinitely better.