2023 Narbonne

Day 1

Destination Paris

We all met up at St.Pancras International to catch the Eurostar to Paris Gare du Nord. We have overnight accomodation booked near Gare de Lyon Station at the Hotel Prince Albert Concordia. Would recommend this hotel if staying in Paris.

class="para-light" We had a meal in the Aux Cadrans restaurant, just down the road from the hotel. The meal was nice especially when eaten with a couple of Leffe draught beers.

Day 2

Arriving in Narbonne

Today, we left Paris and caught the train to Narbonne where we have an apartment booked. I had to ring Brigitte when we were an hour away from Narbonne. She answered the phone, but unfortunately, she couldn't speak English, but a young lady across the carriage helped out by relaying my message in French. We found the right area for the apartment, but couldn't find the entrance, which wasn't surprising when the address was behind a locked gate up an alley way.

The first thing after settling in was to go to the Supermarket and stock up on Breakfast essentials and, of course, some beers and gin for a nightcap.

We headed out to find something to eat. The first thing we came across was a pizza take-away, so we bought two of those and a bottle of wine and ate in the apartment.

Day 3

A day in Narbonne

Peter went out first thing and returned with Croissants and choc au pains. Most of us had corn flakes except Graham who ate some muesli muck and yucky yogurt. He also didn't partake in choc au pain because he doesn't eat chocolate in a morning.

First thing after breakfast we made our way to the Tourist Information office. The staff there were very pleasant and helpful. After much searching we found the indoor market where we decided that we would dine in the apartment again, so, bought a cooked chicken and some vegetables for our evening meal.

In the afternoon we visited the Cathedral. An absolutly impressive and huge structure. Afterwards we visited the Horreum Roman remains site, which is an underground structure which would originally have had a structure above it.

Peter - the chef - cooked our evening meal, and a wonderful job he made of it. It was a good thing that we decided to stay in the apartment because it started to rain quite heavily. Two weeks before we were due to be here it was forcasting 15 degrees. It is now 3 degrees and snowing and has been since since about 9-o'clock.

Day 4

Carcassonne

Started the day with a fairly early breakfast. Arrived at Gare de Narbonne to buy train tickets to Carcassonne, which took ages by the time they had checked our ID's.

Leaving the station we headed for the Cité, calling into a cafe for a coffee. Still some snow in places and very cold, but we still managed to enjoy our visit to the Cité. We were by now starting to feel the cold so headed back to the cafe we had visited earlier on where we all had the casserole, accompanied by Chardonnay and followed by a cup of tea.

Returning to Narbonne, we spent the evening in the apartment, except for a brief spell where Peter and myself noticing that the bar across the way was open decided to investigate. We just had a couple of small beers and returned to the apartment.

Day 5

Perpignan

Today, we visited Perpignan by train. Walking down a street we noticed an impressive courtyard with a sculpture by Molliol when a lady dragged us inside, which happened to be a place where narriage ceremonies were held. This also was very impressive.

Walking further along we came across a memorial park dedicated to the French military personnel who had died during many conflicts.

By now we were looking for somewhere to eat before catching the return train. Unfortunately, most restaurants didn't open until 19:00 hrs and our train departed at 19:09hrs. We came across a kebab / burger place which turned out to be satisfactory and half the price of the restaurants which had yet to open. We had hoped to have a beer in the bar frequented by Peter and myself yesterday evening, but it was closed. This wasn't a problem as we had plenty beer in the apartment.

Day 6

Narbonne

Today was very cold and windy and there were no buses running so we stayed in Narbonne. Straight after breakfast we walked round the outdoor and indoor markets and because it was cold, headed back to the apartment for a coffee. Peter made on omelette for us all for lunch.

Day 7

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Day 8

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Day 6

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