Carcassonne

7/11/07

Carcassonne

It's truly a magical medieval place. Our hotel is lovely and they upgraded us to a nice suite at the same price. I'm suspicious.... We're probably just over the drunken live medieval music venue. I'm enjoying it while I can.

We enjoyed a delicious lunch in the walled city. I had a shirred egg cooked over tomato sauce in a custard cup and Charlie enjoyed a calorie-cholesterol laden cassoulet overflowing with duck fat and sausage. No nursing homes for us. No siree. Carpe Diem!

The hotel is situated next to a basillica and a stones throw from the castle. In between there are many windy cobblestone paths lined with touristy tapestry, t-shirt, and medieval figurine junk shops. It's sort of like a “Medieval Branson”, but truly historic and quaint nonetheless.

We've found it difficult to get a bad meal or a nasty glass of wine or beer.

Tomorrow, we go to the “New” Carcassonne. It's only about 600 years old. We plan to troll around the Thursday Open Air Food & Flower Market. We're also going on a vineyard wine tasting tour in the afternoon and dining in the hotel's Michelin Star Restaurant.

Friday, we hope to tour the castle and plan to attend a tapas cooking class and dinner at a local chef's home. She offers a number of themed classes to guests of the hotel. Her name is Nathalie Valnary and she had published a number of cookbooks in France and Holland.

My mother's concerned about our barge cruise. She's insisting we absolutely cancel if there are no toilets or if bed bugs are present. She has great faith in my trip planning abilities. And, frankly, after the Ryan Air Ripoff, she might be right!

We had dinner at a little restaurant that the hotel recommended. Naturally, it was superb. Charlie had the prix fixe which included the ubiquitous fois gras followed by monkfish with artichokes and tomatoes and concluding with a decadent French dessert of some kind. I tried not to notice. I had seabass carpaccio. I've never seen this on a menu. It was fascinating and delicious. It was served with slivered fennel and cottage cheese, of all things. It was luscious with that anisey zing. No dessert for me.

We slept great, probably 12-13 hours. Nice catch up.

Watching CNN International the next morning, I noticed a glitzy ad, “Come to Bosnia and Herzegovina and enjoy The Good Life” while showing breathtaking stretches of coastline, exquisite wines and cheeses, blah, blah, blah... Imagine just 15 years ago it was a fricking war zone. My brother-in-law resigned his military commission to AVOID going there.

The light bulb went off in my head. But, of course, mais oui, this is the answer for Iraq. Just send in the fine folks from Disney and Carnival Cruise Lines, maybe even Dolly Parton and the Branson City Council. They could rehabilitate the place and turn it into a war ruins destination point. Just imagine cruising down the IED laden Tigris and Euphrates. They could restore it's rightly place as the “cradle of civilization” The only thing, they'd have to get over that alcohol thing. Even that's possible. Dubai did it. Better still, all the greedy shareholders in the US can bring home the bucks instead of the body bags. They did it in Viet Nam. Why not?

More on Carcassonne and Michelin Dinner later