Carcassonne; Saturday, 17 September, 2022
Originally I had been due to spend another night in Carcassonne, but then BA cancelled my Sunday evening flight from Toulouse, instead putting me on a mid-morning flight which meant, with available trains from Carcassonne, I had to head back to Toulouse this evening and have a night at an airport hotel rather than spend the extra night here. In reality it was probably for the best as I had almost exhausted the sights and museums of Carcassonne.
The only place I hadn’t visited was the Musée des Beaux-Arts which was my first stop of the morning. The city’s art gallery houses a number of works from the 17th Century through to the modern day, with a significant number of modern art works that look specifically at the city.
Having taken in the gallery I headed into the centre of town for a bit of a wander around and a lengthy lunch before heading back over to the Canal du Midi to join my second canal tour of the trip.
This tour headed upstream from the centre of Carcassonne into the countryside and through two different locks – the Écluse de la Douce and the Écluse d’Herminis, the latter being one of the deepest on the canal with a rise of 4m. From the Écluse d’Herminis the boat turns and heads back towards Carcassonne pausing for about 20 minutes at a canal side café in a former lock keepers cottage.
Back in town and it was time to wander back to my hotel, collect my luggage and head back to the station for my train back to Toulouse. I had calculated this so I had about 25 minutes to spare, but that was without factoring in that there might be a delay to the train, and in the end I was sat on Carcassonne station for nearly 50 minutes before the train finally arrived.
Despite the delay I had a smooth journey up to Toulouse and an even smoother journey with connections to the Metro and then the tram working perfectly so that less than 40 minutes later I was in my airport hotel for the night.
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