Days 27&28 Castelsarrasin-Castelnaudary 127km

The weather has been a little challenging: extremely strong winds, gusting up to 50kph and threatening to blow us into the canal yesterday and the air was full of dust, pollen and leaf casings from the 200+ year old plane trees that flank the canals, providing shade (which we could do without, in these temperatures) and stabilising the canal banks. They are clearly subject to statutory protection and each has a little blue label nailed in place showing its serial number. The country continues to have large wheat fields and their grain silos but there have been a lot of fruit trees, apples certainly but previously there were presumably plum trees to supply the bloated prune magnates of Agen. Cath's book on the canals says that Agen has been voted the best place to live in France. The various indigents that we saw did not seem entirely convinced, particularly one who had broken open a street bin to sift through its contents. Perhaps they come from all over France because of the quality.

I digress, since that was Day 25. Toulouse brought the junction of the Canal de Garonne and the Canal du Midi, which came first, historically. Catherine tells me that it was the Grand Projet of Pierre Paul Riquet, Baron de Bon Repos (crazy name!, crazy guy!), 1609-1680,  who was an entrepreneurial tax farmer (the Gabelle, or salt tax, what an operation) and he managed to fund and procure this extraordinary feat of hydraulic engineering. My spouse and helpmeet also tells me that the canal was an early feminist triumph, as Pyrenean peasant women were found to have ancient skills in water engineering and the construction of thermal baths, passed down from the Romans and were recruited to provide technical and project skills. At the peak there was a labour force of 12,000.

Unfortunately the effectiveness of the route has attracted parallel competitors, first the railway and then the increasingly muscular road networks. At this point I would like to state how bloody angry I am that we have been sold a pup by the EU and the shameless bunch of shits in the motor industry. Diesel particulates are a shameful scandal.

To return to more mundane matters, but close to my soul néanmoins, we had a wonderful tapas and wine evening at Les Passionnés in Toulouse, close by our Ibis, which was also first rate: great staff, comfortable room, one of the best breakfasts that we have had. The bikes had a hotel room of their own.  This evening a dispiriting trek round a windy Castelnaudary brought us to the distinctly tarnished Hotel Les Clos Fleuris but...great shower, secure garage for bikes and the restaurant was open Sunday night for residents!  Moreover, this is about a restaurant with the hotel on the side, celebrating le vrai cassoulet de Castelnaudary, where it all began in 1377, reputedly. Anyway. It was extremely good and just what I could handle after 69km in the wind. To be fair, for the first time we had a rear wind but one is still buffeted and the poor path surfaces in the Aude have proved tiring. The quality of the canal route is down to the local département, and they vary hugely.