10 Days in France including the barge Rosa June 2016

An uneventful journey to the Ibis Hotel by Gatwick Airport on Thursday 2 June 2016. We were able to eat dinner watching the planes come in to land. We were somewhat concerned about our forthcoming holiday with the weather forecast giving heavy rain for Toulouse and Easyjet saying as most of their flights pass through French air space the industrial action by the French Air Traffic Control was almost bound to cause some delays and cancellations.
Friday morning up bright and breezy to drive down to Purple Parking to leave the car and then in the courtesy bus to the South Terminal. For the first time we were travelling with only hand baggage so straight through security and then breakfast in Nando’s while waiting for our flight to be called, in the end it was only about 30 minutes late getting away. Although the flight was full there was plenty of room for our two cases in the overhead locker.
We landed at Toulouse airport in warm sunshine and with no baggage to reclaim we were soon on our way to get tickets for the shuttle bus to town. We were booked into the Pullman Hotel which is on the bus route and between the last stop and the terminus at the railway station. This is also where we would be picked up by European Waterways on Sunday afternoon to be taken to the barge Rosa.
The hotel is completely clad with mirrored glass and with the mirrored windows looks quite dramatic. By now it was mid day so we were able to check in only to find that our rooms had been upgraded so now included breakfast as well as more comfortable accommodation and should have cost 170 € per night.
I think we were on the sixth floor, the hotel rooms only went up to the eighth floor where the line of bricks are so I don’t know what happened above that.

The view form our room that night looked out across the town and into the sunset.
We spent the afternoon wandering around the town having lunch in a small Hotel opposite the Railway Station. It was more like a Café where I had my first experience of a “la formule” menu which is starter and main course, or main and sweet from a fixed price menu. In the evening we ate at one of the street restaurants. The hotel had a very good restaurant but we thought we would save that in case it rained. Despite the very bad forecast we had enjoyed a very pleasant, warm day.

To read day two and three our time in Toulouse please click HERE

If you wish to skip this and go to our barge journey then please click HERE