Hi everyone!

Welcome to another adventure with me. This time it is me and only me, as I have left Jimmy behind to watch the dog.

This summer Jimmy and I both turn 40 (mine was in June, his in July), so we each planned something we really wanted to do.

I decided to head to an all women’s summer camp in a chateau in France. He decided to go to a game boarding tournament in Tacoma.

If you think you hear judgement in my voice, you’re wrong.

After my all women’s summer camp I also have a professional conference in Lyon that I’m tagging onto the end of this trip. I’ll try to get some posts about sightseeing in Lyon, but I imagine the actual conference will be tough reading for anyone not in the field so I’ll spare you most of that.

My summer camp is up in the Pyrenees mountains not too far from the border of Spain, but the shuttle to the chateau picks us up in Toulouse, so that is where I am heading first.

I love France, but have never been to Toulouse (or Lyon), so I’m excited to see their special brand of Frenchness. I’ve heard there’s a lot of Catalan influences in the food there, which sounds delightful.

I was planning on flying coach, per usual, but prices dropped to upgrade my ticket to France to 1st class, so I jumped on that for my birthday trip. So today, I road in style.

At least the part where I was in the air I was in style. More on the rest later.

I decided that I was going to take advantage of everything that came with flying first class, which started with a visit to the special DeltaOne lounge in SeaTac airport. There’s the normal bougie lounge that those who have sky priority on delta get, and then there’s the top floor first class lounge which is extra bougie and has a full table service restaurant.

Here it is:

So I got to choose where I sat, and I got a table with a mt Rainier view (because the mountain was out that day) and what looked like a comfy chair. It was comfy, but it was also very low to the ground and I spent the whole time feeling like toddler.

Due to my anxiety meds for flying I can’t drink alcohol at the airport, but they did have some mocktails and decent food.

At 20 minutes to boarding time I left my comfy lounge and headed to my gate to wait with the masses who were all huddled in front of the tvs at S gates watching the World Cup match. The game was USA vs Belgium, played at our stadium in Seattle, and when the US scored a goal everyone erupted in cheering and dancing.

I don’t want to spoil anything for anyone but the cheering didn’t last long.

Our flight was delayed by an hour, and I already took my medication not realizing it was delayed, so I hung out at the gate getting pretty sleepy. They finally loaded us on the plane, and i got to see a first class cabin for the first time ever. I finally got to walk behind mysterious those curtains.

I was honestly too loopy to have the presence of mind to take a pic of the whole cabin, but I did get a series of pics in my seat.

It was really nice! I had tons of room, didn’t have to fight for overhead bin space, and could spread my legs out. The TV set was much larger, and they provided nice noise canceling headphones.

They also served a multi course meal.

Pretty clear skies in Seattle made for a gorgeous take off.

Here’s the meal:

Since I had planned to take advantage of everything included in my upgrade, I heard they had snacks throughout the flight and planned to grab a bunch. However after dinner I reclined my seat to the lie flat position, put my little mattress pad and pillow down, crawled under the duvet, and fell asleep until the flight attendant woke me up for breakfast.

So I may not have taken tons of snacks, but I did get about 7 hrs of sleep. Which is probably better.

Breakfast was a waffle with some yogurt which was pretty good as well.

We landed in Amsterdam about an hour later than expected, which meant making my connecting flight to Toulouse was tight. I ran through the airport to passport control, where an attendant told me only people with a flight time of 2:15 could get in the expedited line. My flight was 2:25, and had already started boarding. I went in the big line, and by the time I wound back around to the attendant he was announcing anyone with a time before 2:30 could get in the short line, so I scurried over.

I made it through passport control, and was the second to last person on my plane. But I made it.

The flight from Amsterdam to Toulouse was my first KLM flight, and it was their cute little city hopper. Instead of little snacks in the flight they serve you sandwiches. At first that sounded great as I hadn’t had a chance to get lunch at the airport and was kind of hungry, but I noticed people kept passing the sandwiches back to the stewardess. When I got mine it was some kind of Dutch sandwich with egg, tomato, and some kind of spreadable Dutch cheese. Honestly, it was pretty gross, but it didn’t make sick which I thought was lucky. Bit of a risky sandwich to serve on an airplane. I wanted to order ginger ale as I get a bit airsick when I sleep on planes, and was still feeling a bit squeamish from the long haul flight. They didn’t have ginger ale, but the stewardess did pass me a lukewarm Coca Cola which is how I knew I was officially in Europe.

Here’s the view of beautiful Toulouse as we landed;

Once off the plane I made my way to the baggage claim area, and waited with everyone else for the bag I checked.

Those of you who have traveled with me before know that I NEVER check bags when I’m going to a destination, although I often will coming home. I hate waiting at baggage claim when I just get to a new city, and the risk of losing my luggage never feels worth it.

This time I decided “hey, I’m flying first class. Checked bags are complimentary with the ticket and they say they prioritize first class pass so they’re highly unlikely to lose them.”

Guess what?

Ok, so they didn’t technically lose my bag, but it didn’t come down the conveyor belt either. Turns out I ran and made my flight, but my bag was much slower. It missed the connection.

Luckily it wasn’t actually lost, so I was able to track it and see that it was still chilling in Amsterdam. I was told it would be on the next flight to Toulouse that night, and they would deliver it to my hotel the next day.

Since I’m paranoid, I had a small bag with me which had most of my toiletries and a change of clothes for two days, so it really wasn’t a crisis. Just annoying.

Assuming my bag actually does show up tomorrow…

I left the airport into 103 degree temperatures. Going from Seattle where it had been in the 60s the previous week, I immediately sweat a bucket of water. Instead of being smart and taking a taxi to my hotel, I decide to save like 10€ and take the airport shuttle bus.

I’m a dingbat.

It really didn’t occur to me that a bus operating in a city in southern France that gets this hot wouldn’t have ac.

It didn’t.

Also, the windows were sealed shut and unable to open.

More sweat ensued for the nearly 40 minute journey to my stop. I looked like I’d been swimming. I noticed a lot of women had hand fans (not electric ones, the hand held kind) and made a note to grab one ASAP.

I eventually made it to my hotel, which is just a little locally run place, but hallelujah it is air conditioned!!! I stepped into my beautifully chilly room, stripped off my clothes and spent 30 minutes lounging in the buff.

Then I showered and put on some heat appropriate clothing.

Here’s the view from my room:

I hope you all are ready for some selfies! I’m solo this trip so all I have are selfies and weird angles from propping my phone on something.

I hit the streets for my first real look at Toulouse, and also a hunt for some dinner. Here are some pics of Toulouse:

I really don’t have the words to explain how hot it is here. After a few minutes of walking around, I knew I needed dinner, but I didn’t want to eat dinner. I didn’t feel hungry.

But I did find a nice cafe on cute square with cold beverages and some light bites that looked good.

I still shouldn’t be drinking as my medication takes 24-48 hours to clear my system, but they had a virgin peach mojito that was incredible. I’m also one day away from learning the flavor profile of mint and peach is very popular here and very delicious. More on that on another post.

My waitress spoke really fluent English (which has not been a given in Toulouse; fewer people have spoken English here than in any other city I’ve been to in France), and I asked her what the cold dishes are. She recommended one with bread and cheese (what’s not to love), so I went with that.

Although I am trying to be mindful about my cheese intake on this trip. I got so sick from eating too much cheese in Switzerland.

At that point I was thinking I should go find some icecream (it’s called Glace here in France), but even though it was still so light outside it was actually 9:30pm, so most Glace shops were closed.

I went back to my hotel and watched the sunset from my window while I chatted over FaceTime with Jimmy.

Good night.