Toulouse Le Trek
After checking into the hotel I ventured out to find dinner with three recommendations from the guy at the front desk. From the map, the city looked fairly easy to navigate and since it was a Saturday evening, there were lots of people out dining and strolling around making me feel relatively safe.
As I strolled down to the first square and turned left and strolled down to another square. I probably should have left breadcrumbs. I wasn’t quite ready to eat and hadn’t seen any of the three restaurants so I kept walking until I came to a very pretty restaurant with both indoor and outdoor seating that appeared to have plenty of open tables. Apparently reservations are required on a Saturday night, especially when dining alone.
So off I went down a few more streets with a number of restaurants that were starting to get busier. The average age was about 25 in most of them. I started to wonder if this was a reverse Chitty Chitty Bang Bang city where people over the age of 30 were not allowed out after dark.
Toulouse is a very pretty and walkable city. The buildings and squares are beautiful at night. It’s a good thing since I walked for over an hour stopping into four more restaurants, all appearing to have open tables, and getting turned away from each one. Since it was approaching 9 PM and I hadn’t showered since the prior day or eaten a proper meal in two days, I was feeling pretty discouraged and very near to tears as I decided that perhaps I should simply order room service and call it a night.
But I decided to try one more restaurant called Les Enfants Terribles. This time my persistence was rewarded and I was welcomed by Minon and two other gals clearly in control of the tiny restaurant. They were more than happy to speak to me in English or allow me to practice my French (or alternate between the two which I just happened to do) and provide me with a glass of champagne as I decided what to order.
At that point I was too tired to make decisions so I decided to do the discovery menu and have them pair wines with each course. I tried a beef salad with a beet root foam that was unlike anything I have ever tasted. This was followed by a foie gros terrine with toast and a slice of mackerel. A very odd but effective combination that went well with the second glass of champagne. Then came a pasta with mussels and octopus that had a lovely lime zest and garlic sauce that was light, flavorful, creative and delicious. The main course was lamb but my favorite was the dessert that contained mashed potatoes, shaved chocolate truffles, and hazelnut crumble that they served with a Japanese whiskey that was so well paired I wanted more! The final course (if you are counting, the four courses ended up being 6 courses) was refreshing with tropical fruit and sorbet (and maybe port but I really can’t remember).
The whole experience there was such a delight that I will be going back again on Saturday when I return to Toulouse. I have been assured that the discovery menu will be different so I can once again let the chef choose what to serve me. I look forward to that adventure.
Which leads me to the adventure in trying to get back to the hotel. It really is a wonder that I am a helicopter pilot some days in that I have no sense of direction. I suppose it helps that I generally fly around places I am familiar with and low enough to the ground to recognize landmarks from the sky. I got so completely turned around that even after asking for directions twice I finally had to resort to using Google Maps to get back to the hotel.
I spent two hours wandering around Toulouse, retracing steps, walking in circles, and stumbling upon some beautiful things. The images of the bridges reflecting in the water were spectacular and worth the frustration of not having any sense of where I was. I tried following groups or not walking down narrow and dark streets since I was alone but since it was approaching midnight that started to be a bit of challenge.
Fortunately I finally made it back to the hotel feeling relieved and triumphant at the same time. And while I was absolutely exhausted after the long flight from SFO to Frankfurt (and the seven hour layover in Frankfurt before the 90 minute flight to Toulouse), of course I couldn’t get to sleep. But that seems to be one of the challenges of global travel that even the $15 jet lag aid (crap?)I bought from Edwards’ Luggage couldn’t solve.
