Our last day in Occitaine is a day-trip. We’ve done with wedding stuff, and most guests are returning, but we couldn’t fix a flight without a lot of trauma, so we’re taking another day, and returning tomorrow. Unless there is anything awesome or horrific to report, this will be the last blog from French parts.
Having exhausted Albi now, we wondered how to spend our last day: The wonderful fortified town of Carcasonne is reasonably close, and friend Rosemary’s house in Rivel isn’t too far beyond there, but we want to try somewhere we’ve never been, so decide to back-track to Toulouse for the day. It’s only an hour, less than 80km, and we’re parked up by 11:00 right in the centre under the Capitole Square, of which more at the end.
Our walking tour starts, if one discounts the shopping streets we traverse en route, with Quai de la Daurade, a walkway along the bank of the Garonne, and the close by basilica. Basillique Notre Dame de La Daurada was built on the site of a C9 Benedictine priory, lost its religious status during the revolution (tobacco factory!) and was then reinstated when the heads had stopped rolling. A black Madonna is the claim-to-fame these days.
We notice the building across the Garonne, and also Beluga flying in (look to the right of the ferris wheel) which reminds us how important Toulouse is to the aviation industry today, sadly it isn’t possible to do the Airbus tour, which only runs on Wednesdays and Saturdays. Also across the Pont Neuf is an old brick-built hospital, still current as well as the medical museum.
Moving on we peek into the courtyard of hotel d’Assezat to view the wonderful architecture, miss out on Musée des Augustins closed for renovation which also looked impressive and pass the street where Fermat lived – the plaque was more interesting than the photo, neither can excite like his last theorem however!
The next destination is actually the main cathedral, Saint-Étienne de Toulouse, allegedly built on top of a C3 chapel so plenty of history here, noteworthy is that it, or it’s forbear, is the earliest recorded cathedral ever, in C5. Once again sacked during the revolution, parts of it look like they have yet to recover, but nevertheless there is plenty to see, including the rose window which dates back to 1230, beautiful 1612 organ gallery, and Joan in front of the Great War memorial chapel.
Walking back through Capitole, we observe bits of interesting architecture: a nice fountain, the 1525 archive building now tourist info, and a lovely Art Deco post-office building.
Our final offering, so to speak, is the Basillica de St Sernin, with it’s five layered spire. C12, a favourite stop on the pilgrimage Way of St James, which ends in Santiago de Compostela in northwest Spain. Here we pop down to the crypt to see some large chests, supposedly there are nine such chests including bits of the first bishop from 250AD.
Toulouse has lots of green space, so we choose the Japanese gardens for lunch, having bought sandwiches at a deli on the way. Tea rooms first, although unused nowadays, they hang over the ornamental pond complete with a few koi. Next we walk alongside the canal which used to power industry nearby, now it’s all university buildings, one is another tobacco factory with the trees making it look beautifully innocent!
And then it’s back to Capitole Square, where the main 456 ft wide building dates to 1750 but speaks of the time when the noblemen we’re away crusading, and consuls, or Capitouls, were chosen to run the affairs of the city. Eight of them, hence the eight central columns, were the original C12 selectees. It’s used as town hall, and for theatre, opera and symphony these days. Now the sun has turned, a nice photo shows the reason Toulouse is referred to as the pink city – the colour of the paving and brickwork is wonderful!
When we return home there’s time for some work before showering and dressing for dinner. We quickly nip over to the bandstand, and then pop up to the bar above us to snap a shot over the city and cathedral in the afternoon sun. Later we head back into town, thinking we might have a new dinner experience somewhere, but Albi on Monday is even less catered-for than Albi on Sunday, so we have little choice, fast food excepted, than to return to La Pontié for the third night in four. Happily, we have not exhausted their menu so realistically it’s not even relevant.
We opt to share foie gras first, a good job considering how much arrives, two heart-attacks on a plate could eventually be one too many, but the pâté is wonderful! Unfortunately it’s 69 minutes between being served our starter and our main course – goodness know what went wrong in the kitchen – and they didn’t even offer a wine top-up which one might have thought obligatory in the circumstances, or at the very least an apology! Fortunately the rib-eye is excellent, as is the rack of pork ribs.
