Irene & Katy do Languedoc

For the first week of the recently passed vacances d'hiver (winter vacation), you'll remember that I hosted the lovely Miss Irene Gasser down here in southern France. The visit was very special for several reasons... 1) Irene was my only (more-than-one-day) visitor this year! 2) We magically worked it out to where we both had vacation and were free at the same time. 3) We now have now covered even more geography with our friendship. 4) This was the fourth time for us to see each other in a calendar year (March '12 - February '13)!

We set out to stay close enough to Narbonne to only do daytrips. In this post, you'll see highlights from cities you've already seen: Narbonne, Carcassonne, Montpellier, and Perpignan!

the location of the visited cities in relation to Narbonne (red pinpoint)

Narbonne

We spent a couple days strollin' around Narbonne, struggling against the wind, and seeing what the city and the museum pass had to offer. We did one of my favorite things, which is to go to Les Halles for lunch (which for some reason I didn't take pictures of). It was great to show Irene around my little Narbonne and explain my life here, which I really don't get to do much this year as it's a little far for visitors from the States! We also fit in plenty of time for drinking tea, eating pain au chocolat, watching movies, and staying up talking; it was great to spend time together in such a relaxed way!

Irene on the ol' Via Domitia. And by "ol'," I mean about 2,000 years old.

fighting the wind!

the cathedral I see through my window

looking down on the Place de l'Hôtel de Ville and the Via Domitia from the tower of the Palais des Archeveques

cathedral cloister

... and on the the Roman Horreum (underground warehouse)

Let's pretend all the trees aren't ugly and dead. #winterinnarbonne

...and then on to the Charles Trenet house (more about Narbonne's one celebrity, Charles Trenet, at... some point later in life)*

There's a Charles Trenet karaoke machine in his bedroom... what?!

.

This is marking the Porte de Perpignan, or the Gate of Perpignan, which used to be a gate in the fortifications.

Then we hit up the lapidary museum, which is in a church. It's the largest collection of this type of stone in Europe; it's all Roman stones used for decoration or inscription.

Carcassonne

We headed to Carcassonne on Saturday and it. was. FREEZING. I don't know what the deal is with Carcassonne, but both times I've been there (and every time my other friends have been there), it is just FREEZING and gloomy and soooo windy. But we braved it anyway, and went to see a bit of the modern city as well as the impressive medieval city on a hill.

random market

gate near which is located the "Office de Tourisme" - I put it in quotation marks because in the end it didn't exist. We figured that out after taking conflicting and evidently false directions from several French people. Story of my life this year.

the Cité from afar

...and up close

See the crowds we were fighting?

This is the point at which it actually began SNOWING. As in "Hey, Irene, my dear friend from Germany. Please join me in the south of France for a week so that you can get away from the cold for a bit. OH JUST KIDDING, it's snowing." We had our little picnic, attempting to find shelter from the wind behind a well. It didn't work, as a nearby chair literally took flight and launched itself at Irene. It was THAT windy. The good news is that when we went to try to get into the museum, we clearly looked PATHETIC because instead of charging us the €8.50 price for adults (or even the €6.50 reduced price ticket),  the lady let us in for FREE. Score one for Carcassonne!

You don't say. (Les vents = winds)

inside the cathedral - Allegedly, this is the oldest organ in France. But I didn't see anything about that inside sooo who really knows.

bust of Dame Carcas, from the legend (previously explained)

Montpellier

Next, we headed to Montpellier! The weather was definitely better... at least there was sun and no snow! We did struggle with the fact that a lot of things had reduced or nonexistent hours due to the school vacation and the fact that it was Monday, but we still had a good time strollin' around the city and profite-ing from the green spaces and sunshine!

Place de la Comédie

picnic on a park bench in the Place du Peyrou

You've already seen this picture... but I think it's cute! That's the Château d'Eau in the background.

l'Aqueduc Saint-Clément

l'Arc de Triomphe

polka-dotted street!

We stumbled upon this adorable bookshop/tea room, "Le Bookshop." They sell English books and serve as a meeting point for cultural and linguistic exchanges.

Annnnnd all of their teas are named after authors! (Not sure if you can see that on the right there.)

Here are just some random and adorable earrings. Love the macarons (all along the top)!

Perpignan**

On a sunny Wednesday, we decided to head south to Catalan country and wander around in colorful Perpignan. I didn't realized before how many cute shops Perpignan had! We had a great time just looking around.

The train station, called el centre del món ("the center of the world" in Catalan), is named such because Dalí considered it to be the center of the world, due to how many inspirational ideas came to him while he was traveling via the gare. When they renovated, they used influences from Dalí as well. Dalí even has a painting called "La gare de Perpignan."

palm treeeees!

lunch spot

The city of Perpignan grants free entrance to the Xanxo House, so we thought we'd check it out. While reading about it, Irene noticed something a bit funny. See the English translation at the bottom, line 4? Apparently Bernat Xanxo was a reputable burger. Not just like a McDo burger, y'all - a reputable burger.*** We laughed so hard. Too many funny French-English translations... I should really start recording them!

Upon entrance, they show you to this room. Thanks, city of Perpignan! How does this even count as free entrance to something?! To be fair, there is one slightly more impressive room upstairs. But quand-même. Seriously.

fun tea shop

We found this great store for spices, jams, local food/drink products. I could have looked at/smelled every. single. product. in the store!

Represent.

Remember these arms from the other Perpignan post?

... Well I figured out what they mean! They represent the three classes of citizens of medieval society. Please note the repeated use of "reputable burgers."

....................

We covered a lot of ground in these four cities, and a lot of climate changes to boot! It was fun to show Irene around these cities that I had seen before, but she hadn't. I got to play guide (sometimes more successfully than others), and much general profite-ing was done. But don't worry, this isn't the last post of our adventures... more coming soon!

*Okay, basically, he wrote/sang this song. And some other stuff too but mainly that one.

**These pictures are all stolen from Irene, as I was (yet again) having some technical difficulties with my camera.

***If you couldn't tell, they meant burgher.