Toulouse Travel Articles & Travelogues

FRANCE TRAVEL ARTICLES

TOULOUSE September 2002

We arrived in Toulouse to find massive road works in the centre of town, just where we needed to turn to go to the Hôtel Castellane. Apparently, this was all down to an extension of the Metro. Anyway, we eventually found our way back to the hotel and were soon on our way to the main square.

Place du Capitole is a huge square encompassing various municipal buildings and the opera house. There are lots of cafés and restaurants there and we had a beer at La Florida. We sat there for some time, watching what was going on in the square. Well, there wasn’t much going on by this time, but when we had arrived there had been a large police presence and lots of people from the press. We guessed that it must have been either an important visitor or some sort of demonstration.

Later, after looking at a few more menus around the square, we decided to eat at La Florida. I had foie gras followed by steak kebab. Norman had mozzarella and tomatoes followed by fillet steak. We both had chips and coffee to follow. It was very good and only cost about £34.

The following morning, 29th September, we had coffee, bread and butter in one of the cafés in Capitole, and then walked down to the River Garonne, past the Fine Arts College and around the precincts of a large church and school. Then we went back to the hotel before setting out again to see the cathedral. Afterwards, we went to the Bistrot Montmartre in Place St. Georges, where we had coffee. This was a rather pleasant little square, with a few cafés, gardens and a fountain.

We had read about the Fondation Bemberg, an art gallery in the Hôtel Assezat, on of the “particular hotels”. These are large old houses of note. The gallery had a great collection including lots of impressionist paintings and a whole room of Bonnards. The building was impressive too. When we left, we walked along the riverside through an area of parkland. It was very pleasant, and so was the weather. From there we cut back to St. Sernin, an impressive Romanesque church with a tower that doesn’t seem to belong to it! It’s a beautiful tower, added at a later date, but it is in a completely different style.

Back at Place du Capitole, we had a cheese sandwich and a fruit juice before wandering back to the hotel. We started talking to the receptionist, who spoke excellent English. He told us he had worked in the Piccadilly Hotel in Manchester as well as in Coventry and London. He said he was originally from Perigueux, our next destination, and was working in Toulouse until he retired in a few months. Naturally, we started talking about food and he recommended a restaurant, Le Bon Vivre, in Place Wilson.

Well, he didn’t know much about food! The restaurant wasn’t good, even though it was busy. But that might have been because most of the other restaurants in town were closed on Sunday! Anyway, we both had haricot bean and ham soup, which might have been quite good had it been hot instead of lukewarm. Norman had a cep omelette, which he said was overcooked and not good. I had tournedos of duck with foie gras (poêlle), mashed potato and mushrooms. The duck was much too rare, not the pink I had ordered, and was so tough that I couldn’t eat it. Afterwards I had a fig sorbet with Armagnac, which I didn’t like. Norman tried it and he didn’t like it either. With a glass of wine each, it cost about £40. We decided not to stay there for coffee and went to Café Albert in Place du Capitole instead.