Carcassonne, France

What a weekend! Thank you John for the fabulous birthday and third anniversary present!

• To start our weekend off, we met up with some friends (Jess, Andrew and Nik, whom we met at Ultimate, and DTM) at Tower Hill for a Friday the 13th Jack the Ripper walking tour. Sounds very touristy I know, but it wasn’t so bad.
  
• We learned about the Whitechapel murders of 1888, and also several other London history tid bits, whilst walking around what used to be the walled city of London and into East London. There is still an evident dividing line between the two areas; the corporate district (glass office towers) vs. brick buildings originally constructed in the 1700s. Near Tower Hill there is a section of a Roman wall still standing; a hotel and two office buildings have been constructed around it.
  The horrific string of murders in 1888 were recapped in detail, including evidence, botched investigations by the competing Metropolitan Police and Scotland Yard (London City vs East End), suspects, and conspiracy theories.
  Oh, the history we were walking on. (Oh, how I sound like my mom.)
  Unfortunately, after the tour, we didn’t have time to enjoy the East End (Brick Lane) curry restaurants because we had to get home to bed for our early departure Saturday morning.
  
• We awoke at 2:45 a.m. on Saturday to start our commute to Stansted airport. The first leg was via car service to Liverpool Street Train Station, the second leg was the Stansted Express train, getting us there in time for our 6:20 a.m. Planes, trains and automobiles (in reverse order).
  The combo of Stansted and Ryan Air was an experience. It met our “low fare” expectations and for us was about on par with shopping at Superstore. We managed it without grief though; we each just had small backpack carry-ons and we found seats together on the flight out and back.
  The early rise wasn’t as bad as it sounds, for me that is, given that I am pretty much narcoleptic when traveling tired. I awoke raring to go when we arrived to sunshine in Carcassonne, France.
  
• We moved at a relaxing pace the whole weekend, soaking up our French, medieval surroundings. We lucked out and had sunshine the entire time.
  We were there three years and three weeks after our first visit in 2003 on our honeymoon, and we were there to celebrate our third anniversary and my three to the power of three birthday : )
  Carcassonne is home to a large, medieval, double walled village, of which you have free reign to explore. It is filled with neat old buildings, narrow cobblestone roads, shops, cafes, restaurants, a medieval castle, a basilica, a few museums and an amphitheater. The City dates back to Roman times, but the construction, as you see it today, is from around the 1200s.
  We started off our day with café au laits and baguettes with jam at a café in the medieval village.
  After the success of our Friday night walking tour, we signed up for a tour of the castle and ramparts for the later in the afternoon and then headed down the hill into the actual town of Carcassonne.
  We wandered a park on a river and the Farmers market and then had more coffee sitting in the sunshine. We also indulged in crepes.
  We thoroughly enjoyed our afternoon tour of the castle and ramparts, learning all about medieval warfare and the purpose behind all of the fortress’ features. We also checked out the gothic cathedral; I’m always amazed by the stained glass work.
  
• We checked into our hotel and then walked around the City, on the outside of the inner wall. As you walk around the City wall you can make out different time periods of construction, improvements to penetrated areas of the wall, filled in entrances, and holes where wood beams here placed.
  We then indulged in some wine/beer on a patio, people watching. You can see we weren’t moving at a very fast pace. After that we dined on traditional French onion soup and Cassoulet, and that pretty much put us to sleep.
  We hit the sack early, mainly because we couldn’t keep our eyes open, and slept for 12 hours.
  
• Sunday we did more of the same, café au laits on a patio, and omelets for brunch.
  We went to the Museum of the Middle Ages which wasn’t much, but it gave us a good history of the area and there was a neat exhibit detailing how an attack was waged against the City.
  It was then time to stretch our legs and explore outside the walls and the town. We followed a bike path through some vineyards and up a hill with a great few of the walled City.
  John hadn’t had his fill of gruesome things yet for the weekend, so he went to the Torture Museum, and I went and sat on the wall in the sun. He took photos and was quick to show me the picture of a real chastity belt – it did not look comfortable for any party involved!
  That completed our time in the beautiful city, so we grabbed one more crepe and jumped on the airport shuttle.
  
• While Carcassonne may be touristy, we highly recommend visiting it. Being inside the old walled town takes you right back in time and the café au laits aren’t bad either.
  
• John is booking our next trip as I write this, to Slovenia at the beginning of November! This time we’re flying from Luton Airport and with Wizz Air (I’ll keep you posted on how that goes).