Usually I’m chained to my desk and don’t get into town on weekdays. But when I do, I love it. We had an important mission: ordering tile for the apartment. We went to Ferrand, which did our kitchen when we moved here, and which has a gorgeous showroom.
Since we were in town, we popped by to check on the renovation. The electricians were hard at work. The place is getting completely rewired, a huge task that involves piercing 2-foot-thick stone walls and then covering it all up.
Then we went next door to Place Carnot for a coffee. It was another gray but mild day, and the terraces were full of people.
There’s a small market on Tuesdays, a slightly bigger one on Thursdays and the major one on Saturdays. Because how can you expect something to be fresh if you shop only once a week?
The contrast with the other day at la Cité was sharp. La Cité was very, very quiet (which I find wonderful, actually). La Bastide, or the lower town, was calmer than on Saturdays, but still lively. Carcassonne is a small city, so the level of activity is never very high. There’s a gentleness and intimacy to the encounters you see. Many of the locals — les Carcassonais de souches — are relatives or went to school together, like in any small town. And it’s fun to watch the local matrons picking up their weekday produce, while holding small dogs on the leash and wearing short fur coats despite temps in the low 50s.
Taste of France 
What a very nice blog, so happy to have found it, and your new apartment looks as if it’s going to be a showpiece if the snippets of decoration shown earlier are any indication. Making note of the Place Carnot market for a future trip.
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Thank you! Let me know if you come to Carcassonne. I plan to post recommendations for restaurants, wineries, sights to see, etc.
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Have been trying to get there to do a language intensive for the last year, but Life keeps happening. I’ve been there briefly en route to see friends farther south in the Aude, and liked what I saw.
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