Toulouse: a brief encounter
by Jonathan
After wrapping up the last few ends at Chateau Brametourte, and with Christine still in Berlin, I was headed for a night in Toulouse on my way to Paris.
Because the train was an hour late, I had difficulty rendez-vous-ing with my couchsurf host, Mathieu, despite my repeated phone calls to his mobile. As I later found out, his phone had been stolen some time prior and he’d forgot to update his profile. Luckily, I had written the directions to his apartment and so after not finding him at his workplace, I trudged along with my two extra bags in hand (a favor for Christine – restricted by airline baggage rules). Upon alighting the easy-to-use tram, I found myself in a deserted sprawling university campus with nary a signpost. After asking several people with little success, wandering around aimlessly while rumbling skies threatened rain, I saw a sign for his building off in the distance. After a bit more walking, we finally met and I was grateful to unload my bags.
We decided to brave the ominous skies and ride bicycles downtown. Toulouse has an excellent commuter bike rental program with corrals all over the town. The fee is 1€ for 24 hours and you can ride for up to 30 minutes before you need to check it back in. But then you can just check out another one! As the sky dripped and drizzled we rode along the Canal du Midi which connects the Mediterranean Sea to the Atlantic. The city has well-marked cycle paths and it was great fun to be riding a bicycle again, unburdened and air-cooled in the warm summer evening.
We walked around the center and Mathieu took me to find a falafel sandwich, after which we continued our walking tour of the lively Toulouse nightlife (this is a Monday night) with all the students on vacation. Toulouse is the fourth largest city in France and has the second highest student population. I had flashbacks of my university days…
As the rain increased we headed home and Mathieu was nice enough to show me how to play his accordion, the kind with round identical buttons instead of a piano-like keyboard. His had a great sound and it was fun to play around before we fell fast asleep.
The next morning I packed up and took the tram downtown with Mathieu – he kindly let me stow my bags in the closet at work until I caught my afternoon train. So with the morning in Toulouse to myself, I hopped on a bike and cruised the parks, finding a bio shop (organic food) and fortunately, the tiny bio market in the spacious Place du Capitol. I bought spelt bread, olives, tomatoes and cucumber, along with multi-seed crackers and spicy chips – all organic! This would provide a fantastic dinner on the train into Paris. But meanwhile, still in Toulouse, I was craving another falafel sandwich for lunch. After visiting a cathedral and a basilica, and bidding farewell to Mathieu, I was off to the station for a special train to Paris. The first-class tickets were on promotion and were the cheapest on the high-speed TGV train – the fastest train in Europe. Oddly, we were over an hour late getting into Paris, but the train did go really fast…
Tags: 2009-July, couchsurfing, Toulouse, Tag Index
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