Toulouse, 100%

I have always thought that to fall in love with travel, you need to wake up with the place you are visiting. Many years ago, when I traveled far less, when every trip to France was so precious, I used to get up at sunrise and walk the streets of Paris, feeling that morning energy as the people readied themselves for the day ahead. Sidewalks washed, men and women grabbing a croissant and a coffee at cafe bars, kids hurrying to school. These days I'm tied to hotel breakfasts (so, no croissant by a window of a local cafe) and I hatch plans for the day, and so I've let the early morning walks slip by.

But today is different. I mean, for one thing, I have a fat sausage of a lump hanging over my eye (but the wound itself looks magnificent! Biologique sealing worked its magic). And I have only to stay in Toulouse. No trips outside the city. Sure, there is a fabulous breakfast right here, in my hotel, but I'm still feeling full from last night's late dinner. So I pass on it and instead, I walk over to the Place du Capitole -- where stands the splendid City Hall (built in the 1750s) and where normally you'd be seeing a great expanse of a square, with a bronze Occitan cross worked into the pavement. Not today though. They're still cleaning up after the weekend wine festival. Let me post a snapshot of the Capitole anyway. Just to get a feeling for what it's like.  Imagine that the white tents are gone already. Puff! All open and beautiful.

I would have gone inside the Capitole, but it's closed until later in the day. I read that there is a beautiful room painted by Paul Gervais (he was popular at the turn of the 20th century for his sensuous paintings of nude women). He dedicated it to love. That might be fun to see. No matter. Not today.

In the back of the Capitole is the oldest building in Toulouse -- the 16th century Donjon, or the archive tower. Take a look (it now houses the Tourist Info Center so I know it well).

My main reason for being here now is that there are numerous cafes and restaurants spilling out onto the square, including the ever beautiful Le Bibent. I understand they have a breakfast formula: coffee, croissant, fresh orange juice. That's pretty much all they have in the morning, but it is exactly what I want! In fact, I ask for a second cafe creme just to prolong the moment.

I sit outside, but the interior of this place is truly something else. Here, take a look:

I pass on the splendor and do some serious people watching outdoors.

From here, I walk in the direction of the Basilica of Saint-Sernin. It's a very agreeable street, with plenty of shops along the way. And here's an important one: a chocolatier, who sells what is Toulouse's most important sweet treat: candied violets.

I know a number of little ones who would get a kick out these (especially two purple loving girls back home), though it is also a pleasurable treat for grownups: throw it into a glass of champagne and watch it fizz!

In the alternative, you can pick up chocolates with violet infused ganache. What do you think, Ed? 

(The chocolatier, working on his chocolates...)

Still further down, there is a small shop with, well, very pretty little things. Like cards. I'm still in the habit of sending cards to grandkids...

Okay, finally I get to Saint-Sernin. Just like from my hotel window, only bigger!

To tell you the truth, I'm not a fan of visiting large churches. Yes, I did go in yesterday to Albi's cathedral and I do go into this Basilica here in Toulouse, but as always, the interiors leave me feeling a bit like a fish out of water and in a very enormous jungle. It's not that I necessarily dislike religious architecture or art (though I do find some of it disturbing), and I certainly have very warm feeling toward music written for religious purposes, but churches and especially cathedrals seem like such frightening creations in their enormity, in the expense required for their construction, in that smell that overwhelms you as you enter, in the cold stone and hard benches that seem so typical of European places of worship. So mostly I keep it short. And I rarely go back.

I give the Basilica its once is enough moment, in part because the other architecturally great building here -- the Jacobins Convent, is closed today (I was to see it yesterday, after my return from Albi, but obviously I passed on it then, therefore passing on it altogether).

Back to Toulouse rambles.

I am determined to do some shopping. Petit Bateau. Galleries Lafayette. That kind of shopping.

I have grown terribly unused to going into any stores and honestly, I do not miss it. Nor do I need anything, except perhaps a short sleeved shirt for this continuing warm weather we are having in France. Still, I remember when I once knew these clothes lines so well, and when I enjoyed picking out just one thing that would become that year's special for me. 

But the kids -- I miss going to kid shops and buying things for them to wear, things I'd be confident that they would fit into and like. With the five, I feel confident now only with two (the girls in Chicago). The Madison bunch pose a challenge. Snowdrop has very specific and very unpredictable requirements for herself. Sometimes she doesn't like even items that she herself will have picked out. I try to zero in to where she is heading and sometimes I get it. Oftentimes I don't. Sparrow -- nothing fits him. Shirts, yes. Well, maybe. Pants -- they all fall down. Sandpiper -- same thing. Too, the boys don't much care what they wear. So to shop for them while traveling, as a special treat -- it makes no sense. 

Nonetheless I do it today. For all, though perhaps more for myself. It brings back memories of past trips and, too, I figure if I hit one or two great ones (especially for the Chicago girls), then the rest can be just okay, or less than okay, in which case they can donate the clothes to a good cause.

And then I realize that it is lunchtime and I'm going on just one croissant and two cups of coffee. Call me unimaginative, but I go back to Le Bibent on the Square. I know this place to have good food and I can't say that my breakfast tested their kitchen any. It's my last lunch in Toulouse -- let me make it count. (I am rewarded by coming back: I'd left my sweater here. I did not even remember bringing it with me this morning, let alone leaving it. The waiter handed it to me as I approached.)

I order a pate en croute maison aux cepes et foie gras with a side salad. You can tell what it is by just looking at the picture.

And a dessert, because in France, I cannot pass by such stuff. I ask for a light one. I get the prettiest fig, in a raspberry coulis (with raspberry sherbet on top).

I sit and watch the world go by. My, there are a lot of children. On the streets, in the restaurants. I look up holidays and sure enough -- the French are giving the kids a two week break from school: les vacancees de la Toussaint. All Saints holiday. (Face shading and blurring is intentional here. Such are the requirements of street photography in a country that doesn't much care for street photography.)

Before I get up from lunch I do something that changes my plans for the afternoon. I take a look at myself in the camera lens of my iPhone. 

The wound is getting to be so good! The swelling around the eye? Hmmm... It looks like I was in a bar brawl and I lost. Big time. Or, I suffer from domestic violence and my tormentor lands the punches where it counts. Black, blue, puffing out.

Time to buy some cover up makeup, so that I do not frighten away the populace. 

I stop in the first makeup store that I see -- MAC. I dont know anything about this so I ask the person there to help me figure out how to cover it up.

She does a masterful job using not one but two preparations.

But how much do I want to spend for the time that I am in France -- the only time I am ever going to use this makeup? I end up buying a simple powder, which in my book is hugely expensive, even as she assures me that that is not really going to do the job for me, black and blue being a stronger color than my light skin tone.

Keeping that in mind, I stop by a Pharmacy (Open!!) and ask for additional advice. The older pharmacist, who surely has been around and knows her stuff, sells me some Arnica. I do not know what it is, but she tells me to suck it under my tongue every hour. Or maybe for an hour. Or maybe after an hour has passed. My hotel people explain to me that it is a homeopathic remedy and so now I know that for sure I wont take strange homeopathic pills, no matter how nice and sympathetic the pharmacist was. Maybe I'll stick with applying a warm washcloth, though  not just yet because that masterful makeup job will be getting me through dinner without too many people staring at me.

And then I take all those shopping bags home, and I'm thinking -- I'm not going to head out again for that walk along the Canal du Midi, the one that I've wanted to take ever since I came to Toulouse. Nothing, simply nothing tires me out more than a morning spent in numerous shops. Even nice shops with nice people greeting you and feeling sorry for your injuries. 

I head back to the hotel and by dusk, I am in their garden, sipping a Negroni and talking to Ed and scribbling some cards to the kids back home.

For dinner I go to Aux Pieds Sous La Table (for those rusty in French: "Under the Table"). I'm sure my hotel prompted me to go there -- it's in line with their other recommendations: great price (36 E for three courses, all inclusive) for carefully prepared food. The way they do it? The restaurant offers a very small selection: two appetizers, three mains, two desserts. You choose one of each. If you love food, you'll smile at the descriptions -- could they be more complicated??

My appetizer: poireau poche au jus d'orange, moules, creme monter au vinaigre de sapin, bouillon au pointimarron et saffran, et croutons a l'encore de seiche. (Roughly: poached leek in orange juice, mussels, cream whipped with pine vinegar, pumpkin and saffran broth, and cuttlefish croutons.)

Then: truite, puree de betterave, pomme de terre fumée, jus de pomme de terre a la ciboulette, celeri rave glace au vinaigre de cidre et jus de pomme. (So: trout, beet puree with smoked potato, potato juice with chives, celeriac glazed with cider vinegar and apple juice.)

Dessert: Cepe et chocolat: cepe caramelise, glace aux cèpes, mousse chocolat et crumble cacao. (This one may blow your mind: porcini mushrooms and chocolate: caramelized mushrooms, porcini ice cream and cocoa crumble.)

I have to say, of all the meals I ate in Toulouse and Albi, this one was the most creative (and, too, not overwhelming!). The leeks were artistically exquisite, the trout was as perfect as you can get, and the dessert was probably one of the more original ones I'd eaten anywhere. Young staff, lots of enthusiasm.

I walk back to the hotel sorting through all my Toulouse impressions. They're good. The hotel is fantastic. The city strolls were beautiful. The food -- of course, a highlight. But then comes the next question: would I return? It reminds me a little of Parma in Italy which also checked many of the same boxes. Yet I've resisted going back after the pandemic, despite the fact that I made a friend there and she keeps asking why I'm staying away. 

I suppose it's because most cities are only a grand curiosity for me as they present themselves for the first time. It's rare that I long to go back. (The exception here is Paris.) But, never say never, right? 

The night is lively, but unlike in Paris, the street scene after dark is more relaxed, less frenetic here. 

As I look around me, I can't help but see a bit of the Catalan in all these people from L'Occitane. I'd met a family at the hotel from Barcelona and for a moment I thought they were from here. They looked like they should be from here. Oh, that energy of a people split by boundaries not of their own making! What a strange, fascinating and beautiful  people we are -- when we aren't fighting and spitting at each other for no good reason!

Tomorrow morning I leave for Paris.

Toulouse, and what happened when my eyes were on the train

I bought a train ticket from Toulouse to Albi even before I left Wisconsin. The idea of spending an entire Sunday in a big and closed up for the day city (the French avoid doing commerce on Sundays, unless it's food related) seemed wrong. Albi is one tenth the size of Toulouse and offers gentler rambles. But I left it to my feelings and inclinations on this day to decide whether I would actually take that train ride.

I make the decision over breakfast.

It's a go. It's a super windy day (that's why I actually choose to eat inside), but it promises to be very warm once again.

So, I take a protracted walk through Toulouse to the train station, quite aware of the fact that I just arrived and am now immediately leaving! I'll get back to exploring Toulouse tomorrow, when it's more open for business.

On the way, I do take a detour to the Victor Hugo Market. Open six days a week. And it is fabulous. Meats, sausages, prepared duck confits -- all that Toulouse stuff, but also many stalls with incredible seafood! The French really are nutty (in the best of ways) about food. 

I detour as well to another kind of market -- an antique one. Or perhaps more aptly -- someone's old stuff in the attic, for you to now admire. And then yet a third market -- a mish mash of pet stuff, jewelry, bags, scarves and other nonessentials. (Here's where I find the perfect Toulouse souvenir for myself: a small, imminently wearable,  pink stone bracelet.)

Did I say no one did any commerce on Sundays? 

(No French town I know of lacks a merry-go-round.)

(Cities to the south all have plane trees. Here's a little boy by the canal and by a big tree.)

Okay, finally. The train station.

The train ride to Albi is relatively short: one hour. And the countryside is so pretty!

Initially I had thought I'd stop at Galliac -- it's a wine producing place and no one loves walking the vineyards more than me. I'm glad I didn't. You need to walk a bit from the town to get to the vineyards and I am doing a hell of a lot of walking already. The "stroll" to the Toulouse station alone is more than 30 minutes and then of course there were the markets and importantly, the walks I'm about to take in Abi. So, vineyards, limited to admiring from the train window.

And Albi itself? It's a gem! Once again, like Toulouse, it is the rare French city where the buildings are predominantly made from brick. 

The main sites include a Gothic cathedral (embellished, as they usually are, through the ages) and the Bishops' Palace of Albi (Palais de la Berbie) which currently houses the Toulouse-Lautrec Museum. (For this I also bought a ticket in advance.) Both these building are on a vast square that is regarded as the heart of the city.

Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec was born in Albi (in 1864) and the museum is home to about 1000 works, by far the largest collection of his art in the world. Let me get back to it in a minute. First, let me give you a quick peek at the town itself. The historic sections are a UNESCO World Heritage site, so well worth your while!

Along the River Tarn...

It's just stunning! And relatively calm. And I hear only French. Not to say it's not a tourist town -- it is. But the strollers here seem to be French and that of course is very lovely when you are a foreigner and want so much to immerse yourself in their world.

Back to Albi's famous artist now. Whoa, not so fast! The place dedicated to his art is closed for lunch! That means only one thing: I must eat lunch as well. Easy peasy. There are countless eateries in and around the main square. I pick one (Le Hermitage) which is the most packed (a dangerous game I play when in doubt, since others play it too, leading to a domino effect, where one follows the next, and then they are followed by more, and so on). 

Well, this eatery turns out to be magnificent. Luck is with me. (So far.) I order stuff that I would never, ever order back home for lunch and not only because it would not be available say in a Wisconsin cafe. When I am away, I try so very hard to do stuff, to eat stuff that is unusual for me. So, in Albi I order a salad Albigoise.  It has duck confit, it has foie gras, it has gizzards. Well, okay, I ask them to skip the gizzards. I used to eat them when my grandma whacked off a chicken head and boiled everything imaginable for her chicken soup. But, these days I'll pass unless the situation calls for me to clean my plate. 

Here's my beautiful salad, made larger by an effort to please: since I skipped the gizzards, they insisted on loading on more duck confit.

So long as I am going all out, I order their dessert of the day -- a blueberry tart. This is an unfair choice on my part. The many blueberry tarts I had in Morzine last February were fantastic! This one could not compete. 

And indeed, it isn't as good as the others. But if we'd only quit comparing things, always comparing things, always sorting and sifting between the greats and the also rans, we'd come out loving a whole lot more in life. So, I liked this one quite a bit!

And now for the museum. The only one from this trip "down south," as Toulouse's art museum is closed for renovation. 

A word first about the artist.

Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec was born to an aristocratic family. Had he outlived his father, Henri would have had the title of Comte de Toulouse-Lautrec himself. Unfortunately, he lived a mere 36 years. Now his was a troubled life! He had any number of health problems (some of them attributable to a genetic condition passed on among family members. The Toulouse-Lautrecs did a lot of inbreeding between cousins), the most noticeable ones affecting his stunted growth: his torso was adult sized, but his legs stopped growing at a young age. So, a man of five feet, disproportionately developed. 

Perhaps because he felt himself to be a freak, he found solace in brothels and among prostitutes. (Or, here's a thought: maybe he simply liked the community of women he found in those places. This was suggested at the museum today.) He did also drink. A lot. In the end, alcoholism and syphilis killed him. But his artwork, so much of it created out of an affinity to Impressionist artists (he was pals with Van Gogh), has had a substantial following then and now. Oh, not everyone loves his stuff. Why? Well, some claim that the people he painted or sketched were never at their showiest or gaudiest and oftentimes he would leave you with mere contours and outlines of figures. (The Toulouse-Lautrec art you're likely to remember best are his posters, without a great deal of attention given to the subject's face, for example). Some have criticized him for being dispassionate in his style. 

Me, I've always found him interesting, perhaps because he is so... French. Of an era, to be sure. But still, bearing the imprint of his own country's artistic community.

Let's walk through this incredible gallery, housed in the Palais de la Berbie.

Okay, back to Albi walking.

And eventually I make my way to the train station to catch the 15:49 back to Toulouse.

There are a bunch of people at the station and I try to position myself in such a place where I will have the least competition for a seat. So, to the rear of the platform where the end cars will be. Oh, here comes the train!

It's a short one. I hurry forward, to get to the doors. 

I don't know how it happened, to be honest. Perhaps I had my eyes glued to the doors of the passing train. Maybe someone stepped out of my path quickly and I didn't notice. Ed will say -- you're just clumsy! 

I rammed into a metal post -- one of those thick ones that supports the overhang at the station. Head first. Hard!

My immediate thought was -- crap, I'm going to pass out at the station in Albi and it'll be such a bother. But, I did not pass out, so I quickly made my way with the throng of others onto the train. Except that it became painfully obvious to me and to all those others that my head is gushing blood. 

The conductor is on the scene instantly and he almost had me get off to seek emergency assistance, but I told him I was fine so instead he went to get a medical kit. Many wonderful people sprang into action (I have to say, they were all women). Someone told me to press hard with the gauze to stop the bleeding, someone else ushered me to the front of the train where I was given a good seat. And someone else took bandages from the conductor and bandaged me up.

This last person insisted that I see a doctor. You''ll need, how do you say.... (she googles it) -- stitches for sure. The conductor asked if I wanted a medcin (doc) at the station. I shrugged. What do I know. I can't even see my head. 

In the end, he couldn't reach one and I was feeling okay enough to tell him to stop trying. "I'll go to the pharmacy in Toulouse and ask them if it's really necessary."

Good plan. Now try finding a pharmacy on a Sunday afternoon that is open. I mean, I'm sure there is one, but googling for it produced nothing. Not on Sunday afternoon. Around midnight? Yes. But I can't find one now.

So I walk to the hotel, stopping at a grocery store (remember: you can always count on food stores to be open on Sunday) and pick up a whole bunch of bandaids.

Oh! I do also pass a city fragment of the Canal du Midi! 

At the hotel, the lovely people take out antiseptics and bandages and I feel myself to be doing just fine until I call Ed and he tells me that I really should have it stitched and cleaned. "I never have had a wound that long and wide" -- he comments to me after I give him the measurements of mine. If you were here, I could glue it for you. Anything to pull the skin together. 

I give this some thought over a drink in the hotel's garden. This one is called "Tiny" and though the bar person tempted me with describing it as having a splash of champagne, some thyme, sage and lemon juice, I'm nearly certain it also has a dash of vodka. Had I seen a doctor, I'm sure she would have said that that is a very good thing to have at the end of such a day.

Had I seen a doctor... had I seen a doctor... should I see a doctor? 

I go back to the front desk. She tells me -- you know, we had a guest bang her head on our front door. Bled like crazy. We sent her to the hospital to have it checked out. It was a good idea.

How far is the hospital?

A twenty minute walk. Just across the river.

This is how I find myself walking yet again, this time at dusk, and to a neighborhood I never expected to visit.

The hospital is small. I quickly look up EMERGENCY on my phone. Urgance. In my fifty years of solo travel, or any travel actually, I have never had to visit a doctor or go to a hospital while abroad. A dentist once, in Scotland. And with Ed -- the ER room with him, when he was bitten by a wild dog in Cappadoccia, Turkey. Me? Never. 

I enter this one. Dark corridor. Guard at the entrance. he points me to the end of it. Go there, he says. 

Door opens to a waiting room. Two men there, no one else. Are you ahead of me -- I ask. They give a very long explanation which I do not understand, except for the upshot which is no, they are not. There is a tiny "interview room." I go in, a nurse eventually shows up to interview me. And within five minutes I am in an examining room. Down the hallway, a young girl is coughing so violently and so constantly that I have images of Covid flashing in my head. France's Covid came after Italy's, but they, too, were hit very hard especially in the first wave. I hear a nurse shout to someone "Negatif!" Must be about the coughing girl. Must be a Covid test.

Nurse comes in, cleans my head wound. She apologizes for the wait. We change doctors in ten minutes so you have to wait for the new one. 

You are apologizing for a fifteen minute wait in the ER room? Who are you?? When I go to the ER back at home it's a many hour commitment. But here, they probably don't want you to occupy valuable space. The doc comes in shortly after 8.

He examines my head. Asks me where I'm from. The U.S. Which part? Wisconsin. I'm sure you've never been there. We Americans, when we travel in France, we tend to visit coastal towns. On the Mediterranean. On the Atlantic. On the English Channel. You French, you do the same. You go to New York, you go to California. Maybe Florida.

He smiles. It's a rare thing on this very serious face (he is about the age of my daughters). It's true. You Americans go to Nice and Biarritz. I do not tell him I like both Nice and Biarritz. And it's also true, I do not know Wisconsin. You know which cities I love in the US? Washington. And also Atlanta. The people are so friendly there!

Oh man, your criteria are so incredibly sweet!

I ask him if he was working in ER during the height of Covid.

Yes, but I was actually in Madagascar then. The first wave -- they weren't hit so hard. But the second -- it came from South Africa and it was rough.

Heroes. All of them. Total heroes.

He, too cleans my wound, then says -- I'd like to seal it with  biologique stiching. I don't know how you say it in English (he has switched to English now. People here who speak it like to practice it in the same way that I like to practice my French. So often, I ask in French and they answer in English).

I'm fine with that. He does his work then tells me -- I'll write up a report. I'm sure you'll need it for your insurance. We both have a few choice words to say about the insane health care payment system in the US. 

And I leave. I would have hugged him, but I dont think that's appropriate.

The waiting room is now full. I'm glad I'm relinquishing a space. I go to the little interview cubicle and ask if maybe I should pay. They shrug. If we need anything, we'll notify you at your address. I remind them that they don't have my address. Just the hotel. Another shrug. You can go. I leave, paying nothing.

It's nearly 9. The Old Bridge is illuminated. Beautifully.

Dinner, at Patio de la Table Ronde. I should have skipped it. Three big meals a day is a lot for me, even if I have broken all records today in the amount of walking I have done. Still, to pass up a dinner in Toulouse? I can't do it. But I did cancel my reservation at a far away place and the hotel staff came up with something good, but very very close by. Le Patio, at three minutes by foot, checks that important box. I'm warned it's very simple, but very Toulousian. 

I take the three course menu at some low 30s price, all inclusive. Eggs, soft, with pieces of foie gras. Fish from today's market (this is how the menu describes it), which to me is an irresistibly persuasive selling point. It comes with dark rice, probably from the Camargue and cabbage. I did not think I'd leave Toulouse without eating cabbage. And dessert? A huge concoction of cream, meringue, red fruits and ginger. 

All three:

I walk home with a throbbing head, a full stomach and a sense of wonder at our world. People, taking care of each other. And all searching for the same: genuine and sincere friendliness. Just that. It's what makes for a good day and so by that yardstick (and really, by all others) I had a tremendously good day!

But I need to sleep. No longer worried that I'll bleed up the bed linens, I plop down on the big bed, finish up this post and close my eyes.

Good night!