Blogs from Carcassonne, Languedoc-Roussillon, France, Europe - page 2

Over a week has past on this Pyrenees trip, and so far we’ve spent two days in the Pyrenees, and have now split from the rest of the group. Mark was one of the guys with me on the first Morocco trip, and he come across some guys on Facebook organising a trip to the Pyrenees. When he suggested it, I was all up for it, as it was timed well, and I had nothing planned for June. On previous trips I'd done a ton of research of routes and places, but as this wasn't my trip I naively assumed I could just follow along and enjoy. Day one was an easy one for me, as Dover is just down the road, where as the rest were driving down from Doncaster. At around 1, everyone began ... read more

We set off this morning and stopped at the village of Villasequelande just before 12pm as it had a sign saying that there was a grocery store 400m away. We followed the signs and found the store and the owner asked if we were on the Canal du Midi and offered to deliver our purchases for us. Hearing this, we bought a lot of heavy items (bottles of water and wine, etc.) to take advantage of not having to carry our purchases back to the boat. After unpacking our shopping we had some lunch and when the locks reopened, we set off again. The scenery was long stretches of canal framed by the plane trees, with vineyards often beside the canal. In the afternoon, the wind had really picked up and it was very difficult to ... read more

After rendezvousing with Benny, Ann & Joe at Gatwick Airport, we checked in and went through Customs and boarded our flight. The fight was quite scenic as we flew over the South East of England, seeing the white cliffs of Dover in the distance and then some wind farms just off the English coast. The French countryside was a mix of green and brown and lots of irregular field shapes. It took about an hour and a half as we had a tail wind and we were met at Toulouse Airport by a transfer service to take us to Carcassone. It was 28 degrees in Toulouse, which was a welcome change from the 16 or so degrees that it had been in England over the last week or so. The drive took about an hour (at ... read more

We left the Carmague heading for the motorway but before that we travelled the smaller roads that took us pass the smallholdings called mas which dot the landscape. The crops changed and we were starting to see cacti and prickly pear growing at the side of the road. We continued to drive on over the marshy fingers of land that made up the estuary of the mighty River Rhone. We were heading for the cite of Carcassonne which according to the Bible according to Camperstop Europe 2016 had an aire in a prime position within walking distance of what we wanted to see. Now as always the reality can sometimes differ from what we are expecting and today was no exception. We were heading for car park number 2 in which we expected to park ... read more

We arrived by train into Carcassonne and were collected by our most gracious and welcoming Airbnb host- Jocelynne. It was good to be welcomed so warmly to such a beautiful old medieval city. Our apartment was but a few minutes stroll from the walled city and as the floodlights were starting to glow on the castle walls, our first sight impressed us greatly. When in France, one must drink coffee and eat crusty bread, cheese and croissants. A great start to the day before we climbed up the cobbled pathways into the castle. Lots of other tourists had the same idea so it was sometimes tricky to negotiate our way through the throngs. It all added to the atmosphere though and before long we were strolling up and down the ramparts, gazing up at the towers ... read more