The first order of business for the morning was to find a way to charge our devices. Without that, we wouldn't be able to wake up on time to catch our train out tomorrow. So we started with the reception desk at the hotel. They tried to let us borrow an extension cord, but our adaptor wouldn't fit into that either. So we started walking down the main strip looking wherever we though we might have luck. We finally made it down to the main tourist information office, and they were able to point us in the right direction. A store nearby sold just what we needed for only 3€! :) With that problem behind us, we walked up the hill to the old section of Carcassonne.

We took more pictures of the walls as we approached in the morning sun . It is so cool looking! We walked on the outside walls, looking down to our left into the mote (which has been repurposed as a parking lot for the site) and to our right another defensive wall. Unlike some of the other defenses we have toured on our trip, this one was actually used in medieval times.

We visited the church first. It had the most gorgeous, deeply colored stained glass windows. Bryan recognized it as a set used in the Kevin Costner version of Robin Hood. Our guidebook corroborated the fact that Carcassonne is where they filmed the movie. :)

We walked all over the town. We looked in the souvenir shops for the board game "Carcassonne." (For those of you who have not played, this is the whole reason we came here. We thought it would be fun to play the game in the town it was named after. Only after we started making our travel plans did we learn what a neat site it really was.) We finally found a store that sold some expansions . The prices were pretty steep, so we took a picture and called it good. :)

Then we had lunch in the coolest little courtyard garden. It was shady and pleasant, and you could see the ramparts and the cathedral from there. We ordered sandwiches and a carafe of water. Not sure if we made a good choice, or if he thought we seemed nervous ordering in French, but the waiter sang, "Everything's gonna be alright" as he left our table. When the sandwiches came, they were huge! Definitely a good choice for lunch. :)

We found a nice little ice cream stand and each got two scoops on a cone to cool off a bit. Bryan had chocolate and strawberry. I had pineapple and coconut. The coconut was AMAZING!

We wandered around for a while, popping into a candy shop as we talked about what to do next. The man working there offered us each a cookie to sample. We explained that I had a milk allergy, and he whipped the canister away . "No, no, no. Not for you." Then he went around trying to find something to offer me. Bryan got one of whatever I couldn't have, so it was a great deal for him! But the man finally found something (I'm still not sure what it was) covered with dark chocolate. And then we decided it was time to escape the crowds and heat. So we went back to our hotel and took a nap while charging our devices.

When we returned to Carcassonne, we got tickets for jousting. It turned out to be more drama (in French, of course) and more obviously rigged than we had hoped. But there were some good aspects. They did some shows of skill with the "knights" on their horses plunging their lances through small rings, or swiping the tops off of apples with their swords (while riding quickly on their horses). But I think my favorite was when they would ride by and swing down upside-down off their horses to grab a scarf off of the ground. Bryan liked the sword play. It was extremely scripted, but well executed.

Next it was time to go tour the castle and walk more of the walls. But when we got into the courtyard, the ticket sellers were just closing up their booths. We literally must have missed it by five minutes. The sign said that it was open until 6:30 pm. We were there at 5:50 pm. Apparently the last entry is fourty-five minutes before? It wasn't posted anywhere, and there were lots of disappointed tourists milling around . The most tragic of which had little boys with wooden swords. What a bummer! :( Determined not to let a little thing ruin our evening, we chose a nice restaurant for dinner with shade and a view. It wasn't quite open for dinner yet, so they brought us a carafe of water and we played a game of Carcassonne on Bryan's iPhone while we waited. We also caught Mom and Dad for FaceTime, which was fun. :)

When it was time, we both ordered one of the "menus." This is a three course meal that you have a few choices for each course. (A lot like eating at Spaghetti Factory, now that I think about it.) Bryan got the cold pork plate to start. I started with a salad. We ordered the table rosé wine as well. Then came the main courses: a beef steak and au gratin potatoes for Bryan, the local dish called cassoulet for me. Then we each had two scoops of ice cream (sorbet for me) to finish off the meal. Only, I tried to order coconut sorbet again, but the waitress didn't understand me. I settled on raspberry. Bryan added lemon since I hadn't heard anything else I wanted. When they brought me the sorbet, she explained that they were out of raspberry. So they had brought me cherry. "It is the same, except not." she told me. Then when I tasted my lemon sorbet, I found that it was lime. We had to laugh about that. "It is the same. Except not."

I really like the whole "menu" concept of dining in France. Based on how much you pay you get a selection of choices for each course. It's fun and a good way to try out new things, a lot like eating on a cruise ship. Carcassonne was probably our second most pleasant surprise of the trip (after Austria). We really loved it and it stands out as a highlight even if we just went there for a chuckle initially.