Landing in Toulouse.

This time on the Camino, Teresa and I are trying to cut down on our taxi expenditure so we're having an extra day so we can get to Cahors by public transport! Last time it had cost us 195 euros to get to the airport at Rodez.

The excitement has been building for weeks and days as the date draws near and here we are on May 5th doing it so much earlier then last year to get away from the high 30 degree heat.

We rendezvoused at Gatwick within 10 minutes of each other and after checking in with new bags that would take our walking poles, we went in search of coffee. All went smoothly, flight on time, bus into the centre of Toulouse and our hotel across the road from the main station and looking out on the Canal du Midi.

Our first stop was the station to check the train times for tomorrow and then the left luggage facility and then we went in search of a drink which we figured would lead on to a meal. 

Our route into the centre wasn't the nicest, well Toulouse is a big city but it was rather grubby and there were a number of down and outs. We found a busy little square full of people and managed to find a small table but after one drink decided to venture further. There's always a main square so we decided to see if we could find that.

 Success and there were lots of marquee type structures suggesting some type of exhibition. Wonderful space though, would love to see it empty. We wandered along looking at the buildings and wondering if we should eat at one of the restaurants lining the square. Concensus was to walk a little further so we did heading for the wonderful wedding cake type spire which we arrived at down a narrow little street which seemed to be filled with eating places.

It was near the Bascilica that we found a lovely little restaurant and ordered a salad as a starter and then a main course. The waitress helpfully suggested that we must be really hungry and if not, perhaps we should have the salad first and then see. We did, and I'm glad we did. The salads were so filling that we stopped there.

Thanks to the map we now found and shorter and much prettier way back to the hotel. While we were getting ready for bed, we read each other our notes of previous sections of the Camino, a lovely trip down memory lane.  We went to bed thrilled that tomorrow there would be no alarm and also decided that we would see how things went the following day. We may explore and take photos or may just head off to Cahors a little earlier.