Contacts

We were invited to a soirée at Domaine Gayda this evening, to celebrate the opening of their new terrace. We had established contact with them when we visited for lunch about two months ago, had subsequently exchanged emails and were now on the guestlist. It was a chance to meet some new people and hopefully some useful new contacts.

As far as I was aware there were only two people attending whom I knew - Jamie and Greca from the French Entree website - but that was enough to get us going on introductions and, naturally, Lesa appeared, spreading the good word about 42rvh as always and introducing us to the owner of 'Le Moulin' at Trebes, whom I now have to visit to cement relations. He could be a useful contact as his restaurant is just next to the Canal du Midi and is a natural stop-off for any guests borrowing the bikes and cycling off down the canal for the day.

Before we left we stuck our head into the wine production rooms below the restaurant, which led to a meeting with Matthew Stubbs MW, who is in the process of setting up a wine school and seems like a perfect contact for all those guests wishing to do a quick wine course, a bit of tasting or a more full on wine tour of the region. I think I might go along myself.

We had spent all night just missing the canapes trays and then when we did get to one it didn't really satisfy our food cravings. The dozen sausages sat in the fridge back home became very appealing - so we hotfooted back to Carcassonne and had a late night sausage and potato salad feast - even Christian got up out of bed (tempted by the smell and sizzling noise) to join in briefly. Excellent they were too.

The blockaded guests finally made it here late last evening after an all day drive through France and seem to have had a good day out in La Cité today. Our next guests arrive tomorrow morning at 5.30am at the train station after getting the overnight sleeper from Paris - at least 12 hours before their room will be ready - good grief!