Today I dropped Susan off at Carcassonne airport quite early for her return home to UK. We have had a lovely 2 weeks together reminiscing about our young days as we have been friends since we were both 5 years old. We drank lots of wine, had lots of laughs and did lots of sightseeing - I think she is going home for a holiday!

After dropping Susan at the airport I did my usual trick and got lost a few times trying to find my way to Olonzac to the Tuesday market that I wanted to visit and I spent an hour or so there wandering around. The range of sausages is just amazing and the huge vats of preserved garlic and all sorts of tapenades. The drive home was very relaxing through the vineyards where the little tractors are busily harvesting grapes and taking them to all the local wineries.

It is a pity that I am not here this weekend as the gite owner said that I could join in the "vendanges" where you help to harvest the grapes and then there is a big party at the end of the day. If I had not been already booked into Barcelona I would have stayed for that.

We arrived at the gite in Ferrals les Corbiers on Sunday afternoon and I am now just relaxing at the gite catching up and getting ready for my next leg on to Barcelona on Friday via an overnight in Perpignan where I will return the hire car and take the one hour train through to Barcelona to arrive there in time for dinner.

Monday we visited Carcassonne. France is usually very quiet on a Monday and many things are closed but the ancient city of Carcassonne was alive and well supplied with tourists.

Carcassonne is a UNESCO World Heritage site and has been around since the 6th Century BC and some of the oldest traces of man have been found in the cite location. It has a long and interesting history and is very well preserved - we spent a lovely day there potttering around. I bought a local tapestry - my big art buy for this trip. I hadn't thought of a tapestry before but the ones in this shop were just wonderful and I chose a more modern one which I think will work in Noosa.

We were going to go out to a nice restaurnt for dinner but we were too tired and full after lunch so we had a quiet evening at the gite.

Tomorrow I am planning to do a short cruise on the Canal du Midi from Homps which is about 20 mins drive from here.