L'Estartit, Spain

Sunday 28July

L'Estartit, Spain

We all made an early start today, we needed to be up and on the road by 9 00am, we made it by 9.30 which was pretty good going.  We packed 'lightly' - there were 7 of us.  This was a kind of practice run for our holiday in Switzerland, Jamie's car, a big people mover, had a 'pod' on the roof rack with all our clothes, etc,  plus a bike stand beside the pod, and behind the back two seats were the bags of food, toys/games, and togs and towels, and we were all comfortably seated.  So that works..

We were headed for Collioure for lunch, "Ken" James' GPS man estimated we would be there  just after 12.  It was a lovely drive, the motorway system is a breeze and the countryside so pretty, lots of little farmlets and fields upon fields of yellow sunflowers, some wheat fields and some corn, but mainly sunflowers.  

So Ken was right, we turned off the motorway and drove into this lovely medieval fishing port of Collioure, just around 12. Poor Penelope was feeling a bit car sick, and Hannah's DVD had finished so we were all ready to leap out and stretch our legs.  Well, if it hadn't been for wall to wall cars all seeking parks down narrow twisting roads, we would have been soaking in the history of this amazing little place, but as it was James managed to squeeze out of the jam and drove up the hill

 

where we managed to take some photos, but we couldn't park there so moved on to the next bay,

 

Port Vendres which was a little less crowded and just as interesting.  We had our sandwiches sitting on the wharf watching the boats go by.

There was a lovely old church on the other side of the wharf and as we walked up to the toilets we heard the bells ringing and saw the people coming out of the church dressed in their Sunday best.  Then we had our first horrendous toilet experience , it wasn't that they had been built into the side of the cutting by the road (like a cave) or that they didn't have modern wc's with big metal doors with a urinal inbetween, or that the tiled walls and floors were slippery and wet, it was that as soon as the entrance door closed behind you there was no light, the cubicles were pitch black so you had to grope around to find the toilet and then do what you had to do, there was no knowing what others before you had done!! Gross!!  No toilet paper of course and no hand dryer.  We didn't have a choice about whether to go or not, so we tackled it as a team with someone guarding the entrance door and someone holding the cubicle door open so that at least you could see the toilet in a dimly lit sort of way!

And then we were off again, up onto the motorway heading for Spain.  We left the sunflowers behind and entered the grape growing countryside, fields upon fields of vines, it wasn't long before we passed through the border into Spain.  It was strange how the countryside changed almost straight away, it was hilly and vegetation was course scrub for quite a few k's, then as the countryside became flatter the occasional cultivated areas became more frequent, this time it was olive groves, corn, wheat and the odd pocket of pineapples.  It wasn't long before Ken had us leaving the motorway and heading out to the coast through some sleepy little towns with dusty sun baked haciendas with bright colourful bougainvillea bushes reminding you that this was Spain.

We saw the sign "L'Estartit" and drove around the roundabout admiring the quaintness of these old buildings and craning our necks to catch any sign of our hotel, in fact we went round the roundabout quite a few times, I think we tried every road off the roundabout and became familiar with this little town already. Yes, our hotel does have a car park and a swimming pool.  Ken was getting a little frustrated with us, so ok if he wants us to turn right up this little 'medieval' narrow street maybe there is a modern hotel at the end of it,  "yeah right".  So this street isn't just a street where two bicycles would have to be careful not to knock each other off it's so narrow, this street is a maze of streets, with sharp right hand turns and blind corners and intersecting streets where people who live there never look both ways because there is never anything but foot traffic!!  As we tried not to scrape the car side mirrors on the sides of the houses the residents acted like they'd seen this all before, in fact one old woman was sitting on her stool outside her front door with her feet firmly planted on the ground, and I swear I don't know how James didn't run over her feet, and then a scrawny cat made its feelings known by crouching down on the road in front of us and leaving its mark for us to drive over.  

Well by this time James was getting all the advice imaginable from inside the car and Ken wasn't at all pleased either.  We all pulled together as a team and chose the best road to turn sharp right down to the main city road.  At best it was an uninformed guess, we thought we might be stuck in this maze forever - literally stuck!  How James manoeuvred this 'way-out-of-proportion' vehicle, shuffling backwards and forwards, ignoring the shrieks from the team and the cars incessant beep beeping as we got ever closer to scraping the paint off the car, I'll never know - oh yes I do, he has had years of practice manoeuvring planes in and out of hangers! So yes we did choose a road that took us down to the roundabout again and then Rach gets the hotel address up on her iPhone and "barbie" tells us that L'Estartit is another 10 mins, take the second exit right at the roundabout! And so we left Torroella de Montgsi and 10 mins later pulled up outside our hotel in L'Estartit, (it takes a woman!).

Our hotel apartment was absolutely lovely, clean, cool and with air conditioning, big kitchen/dining area with balcony overlooking the swimming pool, a double room with en suite and a single bedroom, plus upstairs two beds and a balcony in the roof, also overlooking the swimming pool. So plenty of room for us to spread out and relax after our adventures.  Needless to say the children were changed and into the pool in a flash, we finished unpacking and Rach and I went to check out a restaurant for dinner, and the beach, and of course the colourful touristy type shops.  It was interesting to notice that most of the accents we heard were British - shades of "Ibiza"?

It was after 7 when we all went out for our meal, there's something about strolling around at that time of night in the warm afterglow of a hot day, our restaurant was pretty full, even at that time of night, but they quickly found us a table.  We had a variety of tapas dishes and paella, washed down with a carafe of sangria for Rach and James and a bottle of wine for David and me.  The children also had huge ice creams to finish off.  The atmosphere in the restaurant was busy, bustling, lively and fun.  A lovely way to end our first day in Spain. 

Toulouse 2

Friday 26 July

Toulouse 2

So today is Toulouse-by-ourselves day.  Having downloaded the appropriate Bus timetable and route, we walked over to the bus stop.  It came within minutes, we paid, our €2 and were taken on an interesting journey through the suburbs (like any other suburb, mainly 4 storey apartment blocks and town houses),

and little towns, and even through the Airbus site, where it picks up and drops off workers during working hours.  We arrived in Toulouse about 45 mins later, and I checked my app to see where we got off, the bus driver called out that this was the end of the line, didn't have a clue he was talking to us and a lovely lady who spoke English tapped us on the shoulder, so the penny dropped.  She was so helpful, asked us where we were going, and we said we were heading for the Basilica of St. Sernin and she pointed out the Metro station and said we needed to get off in two stops, and that the ticket we bought on the bus was also ok to use for the train fare.  Doesn't get better than that, so we headed off to the metro and worked out which side to stand on to go in the right direction, otherwise we might have had to get off back at Tournefeuille!  Then we decided not to go to the Basillica yet, we needed to get off at the Place du Capitale so that we could go to the tourist centre and pick up some maps, etc. the trains were packed as usual, but no worries for us seasoned travellers, we got off at our stop and just as we reached the up escalator, our lovely lady caught us up and told us to go back two stops,  we had missed the Basilica.  It wasn't easy to explain that we had changed our minds, so I hope she didn't feel insulted!!

We left the information centre armed with information and ambled around looking at this medieval city from all angles, so much to see, so little time, etc.  The Basilica was too far to walk in the heat so we settled for the Cathédrale Saint-Étienne de Toulouse, which again was full of beautiful artefacts and stained glass windows, the flagstones on the floor of all these wonderful old churches are smooth and worn and some are so huge you can't help wonder how they worked out how to to do it.  Again, for me, it was cooling, peaceful and refreshing. 

So, time for lunch, we only wanted a sandwich and there round the corner was a tiny shop selling delicious baguettes, perfect.

After lunch our wanderings took us along a rather upmarket shopping area, so we thought we would take a look through Gallerie Lafayette.  All the signs pointed to a bit of shopping "soldes" , "soldes", and we both did a bit of 'touch and go', but somehow being hot and sweaty and having swollen feet, heads for disappointment when you catch yourself in the mirror - nothing like the picture??  So the best thing we did was put €.5 in the bowl and use the upmarket toilet.

Out onto the hot street again and down to the embankment. Pont Saint-Pierre is a very old and famous bridge crossing the Garonne River, the walkway alongside the river has been there since Roman times and I am sure the view has probably not changed a lot since then (except perhaps for the 'Eye' Ferris wheel?).  It was a lovely walk looking at the barges and boats going up and down, and it was soon time to head back up town.

 

We had to take a slight detour to avoid some holes in the ground. There are always roadworks, not a lot seems to happen, but they can be a bit of a challenge to both pedestrians and traffic, depending on how seriously the 'students' holding the stop/go signs take their job!

And so back to where we stepped off the bus and our uneventful journey home. 

Montauban

Thursday 25 July

Montauban

Montauban is a little off the tourist track, but a hidden gem.  We piled into their big car and with Rachel as our tour guide (and a little help from Ken,the GPS guy ) we drove through the pretty streets of Tournefeuille and onto the motorway.  Most of the motorways have tolls, but they are so quick and easy to use that the cost doesn't seem to be an issue.  We were soon out into the countryside, most of it is cultivated and sunflowers are a grown widely to make into oil.  

They are just coming out now and field upon field of yellow sunflowers makes a pretty display.   Not much in the way of cattle or sheep, but it is very hot and fields that are not cultivated look dry and barren, maybe the animals are kept in barns. 

As we headed into Montauban Rachel spotted a car park straight away and drove right in and parked under a tree, perfect.  Apparently this is used for a market at weekends.  It was close to the centre of town too.  

We walked down into a park which had lovely natural flower beds, a mixture of hybrid flowers and wild flowers, just delightful.  Then we stopped at the play area for the children and by the side of the play area was part of the Roman wall which surrounded the city, there are many examples of these old walls.  

We wandered through this lovely old city and along the wall by the side of the river,  looking at the cobbled stone walkways, set in different colours in a diamond pattern.  

Viaducts and bridges, so old and amazing, how lucky we are to have this opportunity.  Then on into the centre of town, the square was getting ready for a jazz concert, so the seats for the restaurants all around the square had to make way for room for a stage with its own seating.  We sat in the shade and had our coffees and cokes.

Refreshed we made for the Cathédrale Notre-Dame-de-l'Assomption de Montauban, which has had a chequered history of build and rebuild.  The current church was started mid 1600's and finished by mid 1700. The statues of the four Evangelists are huge and in a sorry state of repair and now rest inside the church, but they deteriorated because of poor materials, not through war this time.  It is so nice entering a dark and cool church coming out of 30 deg or more heat.  I'm not really a church person, but I do appreciate the stained glass windows, the statues and the peaceful solemnity that they bring. Kind of refreshes the soul.

 

So out onto the street again, so narrow, so charming, traffic so crazy, where are the kids? So it's time for lunch, and back to the square. 

 How to interpret a menu?  All the food in France is delicious, so it doesn't really matter, I fancied a plate of antipasta so that I could taste a bit of everything, cheese, meats, salami, etc, David fancied salmon, Rachel ordered a nice salad and she ordered for the kids, however remembering that they are gluten free she had to be careful, Jasper is quite adventurous in his choices of food, loves all sorts of different meats and cheese (ordered rabbit the other day), so with lots of miming and pointing we waited to see what came!  We were all ok, except for poor Jasper, the waitron brought him a goats cheese salad with pickled red cabbage - non allergic and vegetarian!!  And - to add injury to insult - he had to watch Grandad eat his gluten rich lemon meringue  pie!  He was not a happy boy!

Tournefeuille

Wednesday 24 July

Tournefeuille

Today  was a rest day, well kind of, we went over to the supermarket in the morning, it's just the local Carrefour (like New World).  Looking round at the vegetables I guess the prominent display which caught my eye were the artichokes, I have never seen such big ones, also the range of mushrooms, we have big field mushrooms, but what was new was a giant button mushroom, it probably has a proper name, but it looked big and meaty.  The spring onions had a big white bulb at the end as against the long slim end I am used to seeing.  So a big range of veg and fruit, not dissimilar to ours

Moving on to the cheese, well, what can I say,

I could have spent the day at this stall, beautiful bries, blues, hard cheeses in a range of colours, huge rounds cut into wedges, mozzarella in white balls dotted over the display, most of it reasonably priced, I will endeavour to work my way through it!  Then came the cold cuts, salamis of every hue and shape, hams, bacon, cured meats, chorizo varieties, all too numerous to remember I'm going to be working my way through this selection as well.  

The sausage selection looked so tempting, big fat ones rolled up, pale ones, maybe chicken, thin spicy ones, all with French names, we had some for dinner last night and they were delicious.  Can't wait to work my way through these!

The meat department was similar to ours, except most of the cuts seemed to be a little more fatty, which I guess helps tenderise the meat and make it more tasty.  Lamb, beef, pork as you would expect, chicken, decidedly more yellow, probably corn fed, and of course duck (le canard) yum, mostly duck breast and perfectly presented, ready for cooking.   There was a butcher working at breaking down a carcass close to the counter, and I am sure he would have been able to cut any piece of meat to order.

Similarly with the fish, so tempting.....

Then onto the grocery shelves, all a bit of a blur really!  We managed to get what we wanted and I think we will get quicker as time goes on, but the language barrier is quite daunting when nothing is familiar, except of course Gordon's Gin and Schweppes Tonic water!  That should keep us going for a while.

As the temperature was soaring into the mid 30's, Rachel decided to take us on an orienteering walk after lunch. Most of the locals would be having a siesta, quite sensible!  It was, however good to see the countryside on foot, we walked around the houses and across the fields to the lake where there is a large sporting complex,

 

back down through the fields and through the suburb back to where they live, which is a 'gated community' with lovely houses and a swimming pool just across the road from their house.   They have a beautiful house, on two levels, the ground floor comprises a living area with large lounge, dining room/kitchen and lovely outdoor flow onto the patio and large grassed garden with mature fruit trees.  There is also the master bedroom with huge wardrobe room, Penelope's room which has its own en suite, then the main bathroom and a study.  Upstairs are four large bedrooms, and big bathroom, where there are Jasper, Hannah and us. 

And so we arrived back, the kids were gasping to get to the pool, as my ankles looked like they were about to explode they were so swollen, I went to have a lie down with my feet up the wall and a cold flannel on my face.  All in all a satisfactory day!

Toulouse

Tuesday 23 July

Toulouse

We needed a day's R & R catching up on some washing and sleep, and being entertained by the children, who put on a "show" for us. I was really impressed, they each had their parts to play and had made up the stories themselves.  Not too keen on the one about me wanting to go for a swim when I was on the plane and Grandad pushed me out of the door?

So we decided to go into Toulouse.  Public transport here seems to be very efficient, so Rachel, the kids and us piled into the car and drove to the station (about 15 mins) and caught a train to Toulouse, the good thing about this train is that we got on at the end of the line so coming back by ourselves should be a doddle.

Interesting ride - although it was an underground train - so many people getting on and off, the train soon got packed. Lots of French conversation - I couldn't understand a word, even though I did 5 years of French at school and can make some sense of written French,  people talk so quickly and one word merges into another that I was easily lost.  

We got off at Capitole which is the end of the line and walked upstairs into the heat and bright sunshine of the Place du Capitale.  The kids headed to the play area and David and I walked over to the information centre, got some maps and info about what to see and do and we all headed over to a cafe to have a coffee and check out points of interest.

First impressions a of Toulouse?  The square (Place du Capitale) is a place for families, the play area, a lovely fountain that shoots up water and kids try their luck at running through without getting wet, lots of trees to sit under, the heat was well into the 30's.  Plenty of cafes with tables and chairs under umbrellas and lots of people just enjoying the atmosphere.  From the square are several 'roads', these cobblestone roads are so narrow, and shared by cars, vans, bikes, pedestrians, there are bollards allowing the pedestrians a small area of relative safety from the vehicles each side of the road.  The buildings alongside the roads are up to 5 stories high giving some shelter from the heat.  The buildings have balconies surrounding the windows on each level, the higher you go t he fancier the wrought iron.  The shops below have interesting displays, at the moment all the shop windows display signs saying 'soldes' which I thought must be a very popular brand name until I realised it meant 'sale'. 

 

Apparently in France all the shops are allowed to have sales twice a year and they must all have them at the same time, lucky for us that time is now!  I am fascinated by these narrow streets, they are so old, so steeped in history and there are areas in all the big European cities that have them.  They have been used for commerce in one way or another for hundreds of years and the shops still look great and must be making a profit,  in spite of the big department stores and malls.  We will go back several times I am sure and hopefully get to know these shops much better!.

Rachel and the kids left us to our own devices and went home for a swim. So the first thing we did was to buy a SIM card for our mobiles.  It was a little daunting trying to buy something relatively technical when you have no common language.  We had a very helpful assistant who spoke a little English, but did you know that even hand signs are different in French?  No matter, we got everything organised and were up and running within a couple of hours. 

The heat was quite draining so we just caught the little tourist train that went around the city centre pointing out the places of interest, just about 30 mins and gave us a good idea of what to look for when we came back. 

We went back to the Metro, and after carefully reading the French instructions, and having listened very carefully to Rachel when she got the tickets earlier, we bought one that said " for two people".  However only one of us was allowed through the ticket stalls, no matter how many times we tried, it wouldn't let David through.  Fortunately a porter who understood a little English took pity on us and after giving David the third degree, let him through.   We had apparently bought a return ticket and not a ticket for two people!

So we arrived back at the Tournefeuille station and James came and picked us up. A pretty good day for our first day out !

On foot around San Francisco

Saturday 20 July

On foot around San Francisco

Our last few hours before heading out to the airport to get our flight to Heathrow and then on to Toulouse.  Didn't rush, went down to breakfast and had the special "Cowboy Omelette", included everything, I thought we could have done without the Brie!

We were packed and down to the concierge to leave our suitcases by 9.30am and then strolled in to town.   Not far from the Hotel we saw a demonstration outside the courthouse where people were waving placards protesting against the verdict in the Zimmerman case. 

There is a lot of feeling and rancour that Zimmerman was found innocent of all charges, and I guess you know that Obama made quite a personal speech about the fact that the young black could have been him many years ago.  So we passed by and turned down a side street and saw a heavy police presence, half a dozen on foot armed of course, and police cars and vans dotted around, they were obviously prepared in case things got out of hand.

So we strolled on, heading for Union Square where all the big name shops are.  It was lovely looking at all these luxurious items, Louis Vuitton bags, jewels to bedazel at Tiffany's, Macy's store so huge it would take at least a day to check out all the departments, so we settled for a coffee outside Macy's and used their free wifi!

From there we decided to head down to Fisherman's Wharf for a crab sandwich, we couldn't leave SF without having some crab.  We decided to get the street car. These street cars are old trams and they are from all over they world , London, Prague, Melbourne, Detroit, etc, and each one has retained it's original livery so it looks great and they just plough up and down the city on their rails and around the wharfs, they cost $2 for the day, hop on hop off. There were quite a few people waiting at the stop (which is in the middle of the road as the street cars travel up and down the middle), and when the street car came people were already standing inside, but sure enough we all squeezed on,  he left no one behind, and at every stop no one got off and more squeezed on, until no one moved down any more so he told people waiting at the stop to get on at the back exit door, sure enough they squeezed on!  

We got off at Fisherman's Wharf, a little before we needed to (probably carried off by the crowd) and looked around for somewhere to eat without having to sit on each others knee - it was so crowded.  We decided to spoil ourselves, after all we felt that we had lived on hamburgers since we arrived.  And 'Fratelli's Seafood Restaurant' was looking very inviting right on the front, so we went in.  It was huge as you would expect, with white table cloths, efficient waiting staff and a view to die for. We were seated within minutes, water and a lovely glass of wine  followed soon after, we ordered Caesar Salad with crab and watched the activity on the harbour.  Bliss. 

We had to be back at the hotel for 2.45pm for the transfer to the airport.  We had over an hour to spare so plenty of time to catch the street car back.  We waited in the queue, watching the digital information saying there was one due in 2 mins, and the voice over saying keep back from the road, etc.  However they were running late, so it was a bit of a toss up whether to catch a cab or not.  But one came into view so decision made.  Squeezed on and away we went.  

So many people everywhere, we made slow progress, more stops more people squeezed on.  Then the driver pulled up at an elevated stop where there was a rather large man in a rather large wheelchair with a rather large lady 'minder'.  Well, "move on down, we need some room here, move on down".  People looked around - move on where? Sure enough he foraged around behind his seat and came out with two metal ramps which he proceeded to lay over the gap between the tram and the platform, and after some heaving and shoving on came this large contingent.  It really illustrated how the SF'ns accept and respect people with special needs, including street beggars.  And so we were running a little late and in all the confusion got off two stops too early!

Large contingent gets on street car along with large baggage!

With only 15 mins up our sleeve we walked (in a sprinting sort of way) from 3rd Street to 7th Street,  but it took us 17 mins and the bus had gone!  No waiting around for us ... So went into reception grumbling about catching a plane, etc, she rang the bus company and they turned around and picked us up.. I  have a sneaky feeling that he would have come back anyway after he had picked others up at their respective hotels.

So we checked in and we were able to check our luggage through to Toulouse.  We had plenty of time to relax, have a glass of wine and catch up with friends on the free wifi before boarding our flight to Heathrow.   Our flight was again too long and too uncomfortable, we may have to do things a little differently if we do this again.

We had about 6 hours wait for our connection to Toulouse, plenty of time to check out the duty free and have a meal in an English Pub restaurant, David had a beef and ale pie, which he said was great, and I had bacon, sausage, eggs and baked beans!  Then onto our plane and a nice trip for an hour and three quarters to Toulouse.  James picked us up and I nearly walked passed him, this tall bronzed handsome man!  It took us only about 15 mins until we arrived home and as it was after midnight and we were so tired, we went to bed and slept soundly, even though it was about 27deg!