Carcassonne

 We were all up fairly early this morning. It was a lot more cloudy than yesterday, and cooler at 16C. We had some breakfast and then set off. Brian, Barbara, and Liz headed off in one direction, Mike, Charlie, Maggie and I headed in another. The drive to Carcassonne took about an hour and forty minutes. As we headed south the clouds looked more threatening but it stayed dry.

Carcassonne is a 13th Century fortified city or stronghold. If I get time I will return to this and explain a bit more of its history.

We parked outside the walls (but a lot closer than this photo implies). 

We strolled through the gates and started to weave through the narrow streets of the city.

At the top of the Main Street we came to the entrance to the route through the castle and its ramparts. The route took us around the walls and defensive towers, and on through the museum. In all this took well over an hour.

The wind whistled through the ramparts and I had to use the chinstrap on my hat to make sure it didn’t blow away. Some of the views were astonishing and I loved the complexity of the roof lines and walkways.

When we finally emerged back onto the street we met up with Mike. It had just started to rain, but it wasn’t too heavy. We found a small, sheltered courtyard and stopped for a drink and a snack for lunch.

We moved on through the narrow streets to the church. It was very impressive, displaying some stunning stained glass windows and an impressive pipe organ.

We walked onward through the streets and stopped to take a photo of this merry band (other than the fact that I was taking the photo so missed out).

We left Carcassonne and started the long drive home along the A61. We stopped off on the way to grab a coffee by the Canal du Midi then finally got back to the house around 17:00.

Liz had prepared a lovely boeuf bourguignon (using beer instead of red wine). It wasn’t warm enough to eat outside, so we ate around the table before splitting off to read, write, or play cards. It will not surprise anyone who knows me that I declined the opportunity to play cards.