Nestled in the foothills of the Pyrenees, with the Aude River gently running through it, the commune of Quillan could boast one of the most picturesque landscapes in France.
This week, Quillan was the focus of attention because it was here that British teenager Alex Batty, 17, appeared in a surprising case in which he had been missing since he went on vacation in 2017 with his mother and grandfather.
Batty emerged from the fog this week after six years in the mountains. This Sunday he finally returned to the United Kingdom.
According to French police, Batty had been walking for four days when he reached the streets of Quillan.
“It was a very sad story, but at least it has a happy ending,” says retiree Martine Vincent, who we found walking her three-year-old dog named Rambo.
“Although I am worried about him psychologically, spending those years away from home in such a remote place.”
Martine, who moved here from the city of Marseille after retiring, is a kind of link between the two parallel universes that coexist in this vast corridor in the south of France.
The first of these universes embraces the small world of the church, the brasserie and the town square.
The second, around us but out of sight, hosts a mix of international nomads who chose to abandon what is considered a “normal life.”
Connecting these two realms, Martine sells crepes in the summer to members of these alternative communes, who come down from their fields for this common food of French cuisine.
“Many people here think that they are thugs., ‘high’ on drugs, but you find drugs everywhere. They just want an alternative life,” says Martine.
Utopia for some, danger for others
The further you get from Toulousethe largest city in this region, the weaker the phone signal becomes and the more unstable the link with the outside world becomes.
For decades, this portal to the Pyrenees has offered a route to a different existence, one in which a teenager from the northwest of England lived for at least two years.
Some communities in this part of France are religion-based, others focus on spiritual enlightenment, others organize yoga retreats. It is a mishmash of ideals and aspirations. Utopia for some, danger for detractors.
“There are so many different people here,” Agathe tells us while enjoying a beer outside the Healthy Life restaurant in the town of Espéraza.
The 26-year-old woman says she studied psychology before realizing that what she wanted was to experience her specialty, not study it in textbooks.
“I live about 20 km from here. It is a piece of land, I am with the forest, with the river. I light the fire and eat from my garden,” she says.
Agathe says that Germans, Spanish and British come and goso it’s no surprise that Batty lived in the area with his mother and grandfather.
A life that “is not for everyone”
On the other side of the table, looking and nodding slowly, is Julien, a friend of Agathe’s who, like her, He has been living an itinerant life for six years.
He carries a pet crow tied to his black backpack.
They will soon begin their return journey to continue their remote lives without shops, electricity and everything that most people would consider essential.
“This is my vision of happiness but it’s not for everyone,” Agathe admits.
Further down the valley, the temperature hovers above freezing, but we find half a dozen nearly naked figures huddled in a stream.
“Saint Magdalene used to bathe here,” a woman tells us, as we explain from a respectable distance the story we are working on.
“Get in the water and you will find the answers to all your problems,” he tells us.
The woman calls herself “Plume” or feather.
She and three others are painting stones before venturing to the natural thermal bath here in Rennes-les-Bains.
“I have traveled and I continue to travel,” says a 32-year-old mother.
I immediately think of Alex’s experience between the ages of 11 and 17, without going to school, as the French police say.
I ask Plume about her son.
“My son is nine years old and I have been homeschooling him for nine years. Now it is the first year he goes to school because it is an alternative school,” he says.
Plume says that at the school, in addition to curricular subjects, they teach “how to live in nature, build huts, do blacksmithing, things that society needs as we go back to the basics,” he says.
More than feeling alien to reality, Plume says his lifestyle makes him more sensitive to more people.
“I don’t think there are two worlds, only one, but it is a world that changes. There are things we left behind, but to which we are now returning.”
Concerns about disconnecting from reality
Back in Toulouse, France’s fourth-largest city and a symbol of modernity that many Pyrenees communities shun, authorities say Batty experienced no physical violence during his years in the mountains.
It will take longer to measure the psychological impactbut there is no evidence that he lived in a cult, according to the public prosecutor.
But many people worry that many who isolate themselves in the mountains end up brainwashed, separated from their families and reality.
“We have identified a triple rupture: with the family, social ties and society,” says Catherine Katz, who supports families whose loved ones have joined cults.
His organization, the National Union of Associations for the Defense of Families and Individuals, which works to identify and help victims of cults, was founded 50 years ago and is funded by the French state.
Katz fears that Batty has suffered from being put on trial for his life in Oldham, England.
“The fact that he did not attend school is a social breakdownwithout contact with children and teachers.”
However, it was the separation from his grandmother, his legal guardian, that Batty was most interested in reconciling.
After leaving his itinerant lifestyle for the past six years, his first message to the outside world was to her.
“Hello Grandma, it’s me, Alex. I’m in France, Toulouse. I really hope you get this message. I love you. I want to go home“.
Additional reporting by Marianne Baisnee.
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