Day 47: Toulouse

October 12, 2023

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We spent a restless night mentally fine tuning the scathing review we plan to put into Booking.com for the Hotel Capitole. While the size of the room was teeny, even by French standards, it turned out to be the smell that got to us. We decided that the minute bathroom was the main source of the bodily fluid odours, and kept that door tightly shut. But sleeping was still a chore. In the morning at breakfast I looked at all the other (presumably French) patrons, and marveled at how calm and well turned out they seemed, coming from their little flop rooms. (To be fair, tonight we are in our negotiated bigger and not (so) smelly room, which is an upgrade to French tiny, from ridiculous. And tomorrow I am sure we too will look great at breakfast.)

Today was one of the few where we reserved a whole day just for being in a place. So we left our bikes and gear stowed at the hotel, and gratefully spilled out into the fresh air. We were just spinning in place looking at the buildings when a lady came up to offered some suggestions about what to see. We already had this taped, because Dodie had circled sixteen spots on the tourist map, and had arranged them in a circuit. But the lady supplied some colour commentary on three of them. One was a fancy building with a 24 hour clock, just where we were standing (not technically one of the sixteen),and one was the nearby covered market where she said almost anything could be found. Finally, the lady described the Basilica Notre Dame de la Daurade, where a statue of the Virgin has wardrobe of designer clothes, that are changed for various holidays. She cautioned that it could be hard to get in t the basilica and that one needed to find the side door. We forgot that and failed to get in. Later we looked the Daurade virgin story up and found it to be one of our favorite crazy arrangements. More on that as we roll around to the basilica on our circular walk.

Typical buildings of Toulouse. Dodie likes the little balconies. The colour should be more reddish - camera did not get it.

24 hour clock in apartment building

We usually say we will rent an apartment high on a corner.

There is no special connection between author of Les Miserables, Victor Hugo, and Toulouse, except that the super famous Victor Hugo covered market in the Victor Hugo district of Toulouse, is here.

The next dozen or so photos try to capture the beauty and refinement of the myriad food items on offer at the Victor Hugo market. If we lived here, we could choose different stuff each day, literally for ever.

Yogurt type things above, ice cream cake below.

The small ficelle and demoiselle are cheaper, while the standard baguette is 1.35 euros. That's about $2 Canadian. You can buy this quality at two maybe three bakeries in our home region, for maybe $6, maybe!

So many prepared food choices follow:

Oh no, not those "wild" farm fowl again.

Coquilles St Jacques, not hanging from a pilgrim's pack.

One looks glum, one looks surprised at ending up here.

Our friend Marvin grows many varieties of figs at home. Maybe he will read and identify these.

This is Jean Mary, founder of the honey shop at the market.

This photo was behind the counter at a butcher stall. The cows are Blonde d'Aquitaine

More fig and other tartelettes. We got one later in the day and it was the best tartelette of any type on the trip so far. The figs were so amazingly good!

Cheese was perhaps the most plentiful category at the market. We are too feeble to try most of those pictured!

This poster reminds us that we will soon be skirting the Pyrenees.

Back in the street, we observe more nicely turned out people sitting at cafes. This is so much part of life here, and it depends on streets and sidewalks that are conducive to it. We are (mercifully, briefly) reminded that back home cars own the streets and sidewalks are too narrow for restaurant tables.

More red buildings, cafes, and even one of several carousels.

The essence of the Toulouse building style is these wide and flat red bricks.

Look, you can order more bricks from terrescuitesdusave.com

This truck is able to cross the barrier, but only to bring vital espresso "technical assistance"!

To us the heart of Toulouse has been the St. Sernin area. We stayed at hotel St Sernin last time we were here, and importantly our daughter Joni lived near there was as a young student. We approached the cathedral from the back, reached that rounded "chevet" area. Seemingly every part of the basilica has had rounds of destruction and rebuilding, and the stories are told on boards around the grounds. The basic outline is that Saint Saturnin was the first bishop of Toulouse, and he was martyred in 250 by being dragged down what is now the Rue de Taur by a bull. Rue de Taur runs from what is now the basilica to what is now the church of Notre dame de Taur. Though Saturnin died in 250, the basilica was only started in the 5th century. Popularity of the St Jacques Compostella route through here helped spawn the present building, in the 11th century. Eventually there was also a huge cloister and abbey on the north side, but this got razed after the Revolution. Lots of restoration work has been undertaken by the state now, since 1968.

Father Marie Antoine, the patron saint of Toulouse

The lines locate the abbey, wiped out after the Revolution

With the former abbey, there were many more buildings here.

A lycee familiar to Joni. "Sernin", by the way, is the Occitan version of "Saturnin"

Inside Saint Sernin:

Some of that large structure over the altar. The public is not allowed to approach the altar, for photos anyway.

Dodie liked this guy. The image is posted at the doors.

As we have learned (from Suzanne) St Roch (1295-1327) is the patron of pilgrims.

So many saints' names click with us because they are towns in Quebec which we know well. Like Ste Agathe, near Montreal.

St Vincent de Paul, with the Sacre Coeur. The Catholic mythology is so well developed!

St Sernin plays a central roll in the Compostella pilgrimage

We went back out along the Rue de Taur. Just look at this pl

A peek through a bake shop door as we began down the Rue de Taur

Rue de Taur, that's Notre Dame de Taur in the background

At Notre Dame de Taur construction was underway. We first noticed it with this machine sticking its finger in the door.

We are back to the central square, Place du Capitole

We split our donation to this beggar as half for the cat and half for the man.

Through the town we encountered groups of kids with laminated sheets describing things to see and find.

This bookstore window is totally devoted to rugby, with the world cup being held in France.

We did some joking with these three police because two had ebikes and one (the youngest) did not.

Old houses and doors.

This is not St Sernin (which has a pointy hat) but the super Jaconin convent we are coming to.

We passed by Pierre de Fermat College. Fermat was a member of the Toulouse parliament in his day (early 1600's) but is most famous for "Fermat's Last Theorem" which was only proved by British mathematician Andrew Wiles in 1994.

Outside the college we saw this plaque about Jean Bloch, who was do doubt a student there.

By the way, Airbus has a major presence in Toulouse. We happened to spot one of their "Dolphin" giant transports fly by.

The Jacobin monastery was a major relevation, and got our vote despite stiff competition for the most interesting and beautiful thing we have seen today. Just step inside:

The painting above was restored as described in a poster.

This reliquary contains remains of Thomas Aquinas

We took a quick turn through the gift shop, before continuing to the cloister. They had some of our favourite kinds of books:

The cloister, from 1307, has 160 columns. The area was destroyed by Napoleon's troops, but since restored.

ds on tour were being shown the types of foods that would be eaten in medieval times. They got a kick from the excellent plastic replicas.

The chapterhouse (monks' meeting room) was among the more beautiful spaces.

Students were getting a lesson about the frescos in the chapter house, but most preferred to have their noses in their phones.

Back out in the main abbey, we had another look at a Thomas Aquinas reliquary, and a rare actual monk.

Back on the street, we could again see the interaction of cars and people. Surprisingly, it seemed to work.

We arrived next in the Daurade area, which is shoreline by the Pont Neuve. This is also where the church with the fancy dressed black virgin is, the one we failed to get into. However, here is an internet image:

Only in France - haute couture for a statue.

The Daurade area is much tidier today than as shown in the old photo above.

This little statue is sitting in one of the arches. It was snuck in there by an artist in 2017.

Back walking again, toward Eglise de la Dalbade

We headed now for a sies of parks that are in the south part of the downtown. The main one is called the Jardin des Plantes.

In the garden we ate a sandwich we had picked up, plus this amazing tartelette!

Some park scenes:

Good news, we are heading for home, one more cathedral and we are done! But oh, construction for a new metro station stands in our way!

And oh, one other thing. We brought a bunch of euros from home, but not wanting to carry a huge bundle, we got quite a few large bills, like 200, 100, and 50. People are reluctant to accept these and unable to make change. So we would like to change these to 20s. The problem is, not even a bank will do this. Banks themselves do not even have change, and all their cash is in the ATMs. Despite this, we dropped in to HSBC, our bank, and put the problem to them.

The solution given by the young man in the bank was to deposit our large bills to our account, with their ATM, and then to make a withdrawal, specifying small bills. He helped us put our large bills in. But with the withdrawal, the machine gave some 20s but otherwise insisted on large bills. With the bank employee beside us, advising, we put the new large bills in, and requested more withdrawal, hoping to siphon off a few more small bills. Are you following this? Well the machine was. It shut down the whole charade, and would not allow any further withdrawals of any kind. Result, we "lost" our big bills and got few or no small bills. Ain't technology great!

We were getting pretty tired by this point, but did take a swing through the St Etienne cathedral.

We end with our favourite guy, St Jacques Compostelle. While most pilgrims will be heading out of here toward Bordeaux, we will attack the Canal de Midi (in the other direction from their travel) tomorrow. Santiago will not really be on our radar until next April!

Today's ride: 13 km (8 miles)
Total: 2,427 km (1,507 miles)

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Keith KleinHi,
Thanks for the tour. Ow Toulouse is higher on my list of places to visit.
Cheers,
Keith
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7 months ago

Patrick O'HaraOkay....those food photos! I'm actually flailing fists on my carpet floor out of jealousy.
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6 months ago

Steve Miller/GrampiesTo Patrick O'HaraSo sorry, not. Plan your next trip around food stops, with some cycling in between.
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6 months ago