Banyuls-Sur-Mer to Carcassone

After a full buffet breakfast we caught a TAXI to the railway station-4-5km. 11euro worth it.! Station not open before9:30 ie to alter tickets- a nice Indian Frenchman & I talked about the train strike happening today-- fortunately after our scheduled trip. Anyway we were able to leave earlier to avoid a 5 min connection change & also to skip one train change completely. First train SNCFwas comfy and enough room for feet. The TGV was harder to get on- station platform attendant sent us to wrong car& we had to quickly backtrack. It was hard to carry big bags up a spiral staircase to move through an electrically operated door to find a woman in one of our seats. She moved. What was really interesting was while waiting on Narbonneplatform for our TGV we were almost blown off the platform by the goods train! Arrived just after 1 pm in Carcassone and walked to hotel Bastide. An older place , clean 3rd floor- thank goodness for elevator- mind you it wouldn't fit all luggage & ourselves in one go. Visited the medieval town - really nice imagining how the people lived and managed against foreign invaders. Spent an hour at the laundromat too! Dinner yummy made up rolls with Gorgonzola , prosciutto , tomato , lettuce and peeled carrot. Yum and red wine- bed time now. .... Tomorrow we may do a canal boat ride before training on to Nimes for a few days .Read more