Château Comtal

It’s 7am and as the sun slowly peeks above the horizon the scenery flashes by at 160kph. We are on the Intercité train IC 4655 en route for the 3 hour trip to Carcassonne via Toulouse. It’s going to be a very hot day with temps forecast to be 40 degrees!! The southern part of Europe has been sweltering for much of the summer, and while we have avoided most of this so far on our trip it looks like the weather has finally caught up with us. Fortunately the train is air conditioned and journey is comfortable.
Last night we stayed in a hotel directly opposite the train station and in amongst lots of small restaurants, so it was a very convenient location. It took us all of 2 mins this morning to get to the Gare St Jean station to catch our train.
Our friends Pete & Lou met us at the Carcassonne station and showed us the way for the short 300m walk to Le Bateau Leander, their lovely canal boat. They are from the UK but live on their boat for about 5 months if every year cruising along the many canals of France and sometimes the canals of some of the surrounding countries. Their boat is a 26m long by 8m wide Dutch barge built in the UK and fitted out like a luxurious 2-bedroom condominium. This is cruising the canals in style!! It was very nice to meet up with them again as we have not seen since before COVID.
Canal boat cruising is one of the nicest ways to see the countryside of France. It is relaxing as you leisurely cruise along at a usual speed of less than 10kph with the water and scenery slowly passing by. The main excitement is when you pass through one of the many locks needed to change water levels, and these come up about every hour, sometimes more often. The canals in France pass through the very centre of the towns and cities and you can stop anywhere you want at any time. Very convenient. Today Pete had moored the boat very close to the Carcassonne station to ease our coming in board.
Pete is the chief trip planner and after we had boarded and settled in he suggested delaying the start of our canal boat cruise until tomorrow, and instead suggested we spend today looking around the medieval town and castle of Carcassonne. Built as a fortress by the Romans 2,500 years ago and rebuilt and extended several times since, this castle is an impressive structure that houses a small town which has become a major tourist attraction. We have been here before but it was nice to see it again. The four of us looked around the Citadel and had lunch at one of the many restaurants until the heat of the day caused us to head back to the cool air conditioning of the boat.
Tomorrow we will leave early on the canal boat cruising section of our trip.Read more