07.19.2008
Toulouse Part 2
Day Five: Centre Ville and 33°C

Well today got off to a super late start as I mentioned earlier. However it wasn’t enough of a late enough start because I wasn’t able to last in the downtown Toulouse until dinner.

Around 2:30pm I was able to get my act together and get out of the hotel to park the car in a lot in Victor Hugo, which is supposed to be a little bit more upscale shopping area of Toulouse. Even though the shops are a bit upscale, their parking structure sure isn’t! Check out how close I had to park to the wall to fit in the freaking space.

I guess if you are French you have no problem getting out of the car with this much room but my fat American ass had a fairly difficult time getting out of there. lol. I guess I should lay off the dessert at lunch, what do you think?

After I finally got out of the car, I was walking around Victor Hugo and man was it hot. 33°C is about 92°F with a fair amount of humidity in the air as well. I am glad that I brought my shorts and some t-shirts because I would have been in bad shape with jeans on. Here are a few pics of the Victor Hugo area:

Since I hadn’t eaten yet, I decided to hit up a street vendor to get some food and what do you think I got? Yea, a gyro. This one wasn’t as good as the kebab I had last time, but it was still good. I also had to get the orange Fanta to verify if indeed the orange Fanta tastes different in Europe than it does in America. And the results? The orange Fanta here is much better than it is in the US. It is a little less sweet, with a little less carbonation, so it’s a little more Sunkist like. So thumbs up to the Fanta in Europe.

I snapped a quick pick of this alley way that I was sitting across from while eating my gyro. There’s nothing really interesting here, I just wanted to show you the picture since I spent the time taking it.

At the advice of my friend Patricia at work, I cruised over to the Couvent of Jacobins, which is an old church/monastery, turned museum. Here are a few pics of the outside.

The floor is made of black marble, and the apse, called The Palm of Jacobins is quite spectacular. (From Wikipedia: In architecture, the apse (Latin absis "arch, vault"; sometimes written apsis; plural apses) is a semicircular recess covered with a hemispherical vault. In Romanesque, Byzantine and Gothic Christian abbey, cathedral and church architecture, the term is applied to the semi-circular or polygonal section of the sanctuary at the liturgical east end beyond the altar. Geometrically speaking, an apse is either a half-cone or half-dome.)

The whole roof itself is quite amazing. Around one of the pillars, they have put together a mirror so that it’s easy to take a look at the roof without straining your neck. Here are a few pictures showing the apse and me being silly in the mirror (believe me, I wasn’t the only one).

Also, besides the obligatory pictures of the Pope and Jesus, there was one other super cool thing about the Couvent of Jacobins: it houses the remains of St. Thomas Aquinas. His remains have been in the church since 1369! Yes, that’s not a type-o, 1369! And if you can’t remember who St. Thomas Aquinas is, click here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/St._Thomas_Aquinas

After the tour of the inside, I paid the 3EU entry fee to enter the garden and the square that is outside. As you can see it was really nice and peaceful in the square outside the main part of the church.

BTW....these cobblestones were super hard to walk on.

Once I got finished over there, I made my way over to Esquirol, which is a bigger shopping area. This is the area where most people do their shopping. It’s a like the 3^rd Street promenade with a bit of Melrose mixed it. I enjoyed walking through all of the stores, however I didn’t end up buying very much. A lot of the stores are really trendy type euro clothing or cheap women’s clothing. Below are a few shots of the walk over as well as some shots of the Esquirol area.

Also, I threw in a few new pics of Le Captiole during the day. I was trying to do a panoramic shot, but it looks like I’ll have to Photoshop that myself.

After about 5 hours of walking I was exhausted so I headed back home for a quick shower and then out for dinner.

I headed over to this place called Guilli Guilli that Daniel recommended which was only a few blocks down from the hotel. It ended up being really good, but as with all French dinners, it took a good two and a half hours. It ends up being a long time by yourself, but it was still really nice.

I started off with a Kir Royal for an aperitif (an aperitif is a drink usually enjoyed as an appetizer before a large meal) and it was quite enjoyable. Kir is a type of crème de cassis (blackcurrant alcohol) mixed with some kind of white wine. A Kir Royal is Kir mixed with champagne instead of white wine.

As with most French meals, there is some sort of price fixed menu made up of 3 or four courses. I decided to go with one of the less expensive 3 course meals tonight. I posted the menu below so you can see what I ordered.

The appetizer shown below is the Trilogie Facon Sushi, which was pretty good. On the left was some type of white fish sushi (first one in the list), while the middle was salmon wrapped in a cucumber, and the right appetizer was some kind of tomato dish.

For the main course, I had a nice piece of beef with Roquefort cheese sauce, potatoes, and a carrot puree. Even though the meat was over cooked slightly, (which was my fault because I don’t know the French words for medium rare without my book, which was in the hotel) it was still very tasty.

For dessert, I had a seasonal berry tiramisu and a coffee, which of course was really good.

So even though it was a long dinner, I really enjoyed it. And just to give you an idea of how long the dinners are, in the two and a half hours I was there, only one table got up to leave before me, and they had gotten their appetizers when I sat down. Everyone else, who was there before me was still there. Also, check out the amount of light in the pictures from when I first sat down until when I left, pretty nuts.

Ok…well I’m off to bed. I’m a bit worn out today. It’s fairly tiring trying to navigate myself in this city even though I’ve been here before. I think it’s mentally exhausting to be traveling by yourself in a foreign country. I’ve been having a hard time communicating in French since I have absolutely no idea what people are saying, even though I am able to construct a French sentence with the help of my books. Thankfully, most people here speak a bit of English, so I’ve been able to get by, but it’s been somewhat of a struggle to interact. I will keep trying though because as long as you make an attempt, the French will do their best to help.

Aurevoir for now.

PS....If the pictures look a little bit better today it's because I'm using my new point and shoot camera I picked up before I left. I love this thing! And for $200 it was a steal. If you are in need of a new digital camera, this one is the one to get. Mad props to Canon for the SD750!