Destination: Toulouse, France
Local attractions: culture, churches, gastronomy, history
Accommodation: Airbnb (Matabiau)
Transport: walking
Dates: June 25-26, 2019
After spending 3 days chasing castles in the Loire Valley, it was time to continue on our journey Southwards! We took a full day to drive down to Toulouse from the Loire Valley, including multiple sightseeing and foodie stops, which left us with a day to explore Toulouse. Toulouse is known as the pink city, for its buildings of many different shades of pinks, across the city. Personally, I wasn’t a huge fan of Toulouse. It was a nice and charming city, but underwhelming in comparison to other cities and towns I’ve been to.
Day 1: Argenton-sur-Creuse, Limoges, Rocamadour, Toulouse, Restaurant Le Colombier
Our first stop on our way to Toulouse was Argenton-sur-Creuse; a tiny little village with beautiful old buildings and bridges. There was also la Chapelle de la Bonne-Dame, which sits atop a hill overlooking the village.
Our next stop was a lunch stop in Limoges. There’s actually a lot of Lebanese/Turkish restaurants all over, so we decided to give one a try. The food was very nice and the price was very good too.
We then stopped in Rocamadour, which is a very charming moutain-side village. I highly recommend a stop here if you are in the area, as it has kept a lot of its medieval charm. There are plenty of shops and restaurants that line the main (and only) street, with many selling local produce like foie gras, rocamadour cheese ice cream, wines and more. There’s also a basilica and a sanctuary which you can visit, which sit at the highest point of the mountain facade (accessible by elevator).
We finally made it to Toulouse and stumbled upon a lovely local and traditional French restaurant for dinner: Le Colombier. Alex enjoyed a delicious local delicacy: cassoulet, while I opted for the table d’hôte menu with seafood ravioli and duck leg. For dessert: a homemade apple tart and a plate of local cheeses.
Day 2: Toulouse, Asia Fast Food, Saint Stephen’s Cathedral, Restaurant Le Parisien
After a late morning start, we skipped breakfast and went straight to lunch at Asia Fast Food; an Asian eatery next to our Airbnb. They had great selection and pretty decent food. Alex opted for some fried rice and pineapple chicken, while I went for a wonton noodle soup cause it wasn’t hot enough outside.
We opted to do a hop-on-hop-off bus tour of the city, so we could see all the sights. I’m not a huge fan of these tours and its the only one we did on the trip. Of course, you get to see all of the sights and learn about them, but the bus is always going too fast to get any good pictures (plus, who remembers what a woman is rambling on about for 2 hours?). At least, we then knew where to go after the tour so we could properly see the sights, like the majestic Saint Stephen’s Cathedral.
Toulouse is one of those cities that is probably better to live in than to visit; its small but not too small, still charming and has a good amount of restaurants and shops. We mostly spent the rest of the day avoiding the heat (lol), shopping and walking around.
We had dinner at Le Parisien restaurant – cesar salad and charcuterie board – which were both very good and then headed to Le Capitole and Amorino for one of their famous gelato rose cones.
