Back for a week and settling into life here again. Work is very busy for the next few weeks. Saturday dawned bright & clear. I went downtown to do some shopping. The goal was shoes but I didn’t find any I was dying to pay 60 to 80 Euros for. I did get a few gifts and a shirt for myself. I decided to take advantage of the beautiful day and drove to Albi. It’s about an hour north east of here. I loved it. It is known as the red city for the color of it’s bricks, seems like most buildings are made from it. Cathedrale Ste-Cecile is a large cathedral that is fairly plain on the outside yet extremely ornate inside – I believe it is baroque style inside. The organist was playing the huge pipe organ. The music filled every corner of the cathedral. A view of the outside from a nearby street.

The view to the altar and organ.

Intricate stone carvings that were everywhere in this cathedral. Notice the painted ceiling.

I walked down and over Pont Vieux on the Tarn River to get a great view. The cathedral is on the left.

I went to Musee Toulouse-Lautrec in the Palias de la Berbie (Archbishop’s Palace). Albi was Henri Toulouse-Lautrec’s hometown and his family donated a large number of his paintings for the museum. He has an interesting style that is very distinctive. It was interesting to see an original painting, and then a classic advertisement poster using that same work.

I found tzatziki at the marche. I love a lot about Greek food but tzatziki is one of my absolute favorites. It’s a yogurt & cucumber dip/sauce. I polished off a tub of it over the weekend. I’ve gotten a bit braver with wine, branching out. Didn’t like the French Riesling, so I gave it to a co-worker to finish. The Bordeaux blanc sauvignon and pinot blanc were good. I surprised myself in liking a regular (red) Bordeaux. I have a Cotes-du-Rhone and Bordeaux Blanc to try. And I splurged on champagne. 10 Euros for less than a half-liter. It’s a Rothschild, a brut Grande Reserve, so let’s hope it’s good. I’ll pop the cork when Jen’s here.
As promised, a picture of my car – a Citreon C3. This one doesn’t shift as smoothly as the cute navy one I first had, but it gets me around. The stop-&-go engine can be annoying too, but you can turn that function off.