My Sunday’s in Toulouse are always somewhat hectic. I have two standard activities that I want to do, go to the St. Aubin’s farmers’ market and church. Since both are only available in the earlier part of the day it makes it somewhat hectic. The farmer’s market is open until 12:30 pm and church is at 12:00 pm. This means that I have to get up fairly early to make it to the farmers’ market and then get the things I buy back to the apartment and then make it to church.

In the new apartment, the trip to the farmers’ market takes about twice as long. It is not a bad walk, about 20 minutes. Also, the walk from the apartment to the church is about 3 times as long. I was very close in my other apartment to the Basilica of Saint Sernin but am about 15 minutes in the new apartment. Again, it is not a bad walk just longer.

As I am not a super early riser; I always joke that if God wanted me to see the sun rise, he would have made them at noon. Having said that, I do get up at a reasonable hour so I can have breakfast and head over to the farmers’ market.

I really love the atmosphere of the farmers’ market. There are lots of people, old, young, children, families, who are there doing their shopping. There are fruit and vegetable stands, meat stands, pastry sellers as well as those who sell household goods – shoes, hand carved wooden products, soap, fabric, all sorts of objects. My favorites are the stands that sell food. One of my favorites is one that sells paella. The owner has a gigantic paella pan – probably 4 feet around. The seller is cooking and serving the paella in carry out cartons. He seems to do good business. It is a little early in the morning for paella for me but some day, I will buy some and bring it home for lunch.

There are always street musicians performing at the farmers’ market.

My main targets at the market are cheese, fruits and vegetables and olives. I have found my favorite stands and always buy from them. I tried to do a price comparison and the prices for fruits and vegetables are definitely cheaper at the farmers’ market than at the Victor Hugo market. I have not really done a comparison of the cheese. I will do that the next time I go to Victor Hugo. There is not an olive purveyor at Victor Hugo. I did buy olive oil from the olive purveyor and it is fantastic!

After returning from the farmers’ market, I unloaded the things I bought. I changed clothes and headed over to Saint Sernin for church. It is an English language mass. It is very similar to the Episcopal service so I am mainly familiar with the service which is nice. Going to a church that was built in 1080 is amazing. There is definitely like it in the United States. It is built in the Romanesque style. It is not built in the standard form of a basilica of that period. Part of the reason is the church is part of the Camino de Santiago to Compostela. It is also built of brick. It houses the reliquaries of various saints but most importantly the reliquary and alter of Saint Sernin. It is very impressive.

The rest of the day was just a lazy day. It was sprinkling and I was still recovering from the time change so I enjoyed a lazy afternoon of reading. I made dinner at the apartment and enjoyed a nice glass of wine.

I did find a new restaurant that I want to try on my way to and from Saint Sernin. It was on a street that I had not used the last time I was in Toulouse. I will try it out on Monday, if opened. Monday is the day that a lot of businesses are closed so not sure it will open.