On the road to Carcassonne

I hate it when I lose things. I spent over an hour last night looking for my travel journal. Now I'm going to have to rely on my memory to tell this story.

Let's see how far I can get in 20 minutes.

Gotta stay on task.

I'm listening to NPR and Sarah Palin's name keeps coming up and whenever the reporter says 'caucus' I swear it sounds like 'carcass.'

Oh yeah. Focus.

I've mentioned a few times that I went to Europe in 2005. It was part of a choir trip to Barcelona. I was about to turn 39 for the first time and I figured it was time - way past time. I had wanted to travel the world ever since I was a young girl but the farthest I had ever been from home at that point was probably the far eastern part of the Gaspé Peninsula. Or maybe Sanibel Island. I'm actually not sure which was farther. I should look that up.

Anyway, I guess I can't tell the story honestly without mentioning that I went on the trip with the man I had been dating for over a year - J, whom I met during a relatively short stint singing Alto in our church choir.

Oh geez. I have four minutes before I have to jump in the shower.

So there we were in Spain in the early winter of 2005. After completing our choral performance schedule, we could finally make plans to go to France for a couple of days. I could have spent weeks, months, years exploring Barcelona and the surrounding area, but we had just 10 days. And there was no way I could not travel the short distance to the French border to see what there was to see ...