Toulouse - St. Etienne, Jardins, Pont Neuf

June 3 - SUNNY! and Pleasant most of the day, with a little Rain in the late afternoon :-)

We got back very late last night from dinner - testing the waters of the "French dinner hour" meant we went out *looking* for dinner at 9pm, and got back to the hotel at 11pm.  I couldn't sleep for hours afterwards...

This morning, we took it easy, then headed roughly in the direction of the church Saint Etienne.  We meandered through the Place Occitane, which had planters full of different herbs, then we found our way to the St Etienne church.

We kept going, and found this Place

All along the way, we passed through narrow streets and by houses tucked behind high fences and private courtyards

Some of them fronted the Jardin Royale

which had a dedication to the Aerienne space program

One garden led to another, and my batteries died (eyeroll and huff).  We had an *excellent* lunch in the plant garden, surrounded by sculptures and "paintings" done with different types of plants.
After lunch, we found a Tabac and bought some batteries :-) then found another church - Notre Dame de la Dalbade - that was quite different from St. Etienne

(well ok, so not completely different)

From there, we zig-zagged through the narrow streets and found the river Garonne.  Just then, we saw a water-skier setting off (what envy!)

We were actually surprised to find that we had come out right at the Pont Neuf!  Somehow, I thought we were a bit further south and would have to walk a lot to get there.  So, we had a happy accident :-)

We crossed over - it's a bridge! you have to cross! - then we saw a sign for chocolate.  Hmmm - sounds like a good place to take a break...  But it was closed.  By this time, we were getting a little tired, so we decided to skip some of the sites in the area, and head back towards the hotel.  We walked along the edge of "old town"

And took a little rest at the Place du Capitole

Then back through Wilson Place to the hotel.

You can follow our route for "Day 3" on Google map (notice the roads named for intellectuals like Hugo and Fermat):  Julie and Rick in France 2011

Toulouse - Wilson Place, Victor Hugo

Our first full day in Toulouse, we were pretty tired, but decided to beat jet lag by getting some exercise in natural light (I won't say "sun" because it was *not* sunny, and was in fact raining).  We piled on our clothes, grabbed the banged-up umbrella, and headed out to Wilson Place (named for "President Thomas Wilson").  It is an oval park, surrounding this fountain,

and has a fun carousel

From there, we walked through the Halles Victor Hugo, a covered market full of fresh seafood, meats, cheeses, produce, and beer, wine, and coffee bars - there are restaurants upstairs, but they looked closed (I'd guess we're a little reluctant to pull on closed doors when we're as tired as we were, but we'll go back).

On the way back to our hotel, we saw the park and statue of Jeanne d'Arc

And, finally, back to the hotel for a rest :-)

Come Rain or Come Shine...

Well, we are *certainly* glad we changed what we packed!  We arrived to rain in Toulouse - dead tired from a full day of flying, sitting up - we were some of the "lucky" few who didn't get an extra seat to spread out in (some actually had THREE!).  We landed in Madrid first, to a beautiful sunny day, super fast lines through immigration and customs (seriously, *no* waiting), and then had a few hours to kill before continuing on to Toulouse.

Once in Toulouse, the airport bureaucracy was non-existent - no passport checks, no luggage checks, nothing!  We followed the signs for the navette (airport shuttle), went a little bit too far, turned around and spotted the office for information and buying tickets - the gentleman at the counter was wonderful!  He listened patiently to my French :-), answered in French until I ran out, then he switched to English (still smiling!).  We found our shuttle, got on, watched the others slide their tickets into the machine, did the same, and then waited for our stop - it was the final one, so easy.  It was also *right* across the street from our hotel, which we saw just before the stop - one less anxiety :-).

We decided that we needed to have a light dinner, so we took a short walk in the direction recommended by our hotelier, and found a likely place.  Even though it was after 7pm, it wasn't quite open yet, but the owner (tending bar next door) opened it for us :-).  We had a nice dinner - the waiter introduced us to "the gold of Bordeaux" - a type of course salt called "sel de la Garonne."  Our long long day ended a short while later - we were asleep by 9:30.  We both woke for a couple of hours in the night, but then we were up by 7 - a little sleep-drunk and groggy, but ready to start our day.  In the rain...