I packed in a lot of fun during the home stretch of my 17-day Euro-vacation.

Last I spoke here, it was two weeks ago and I was just starting the Toulouse, France portion of the trip.

Now back in New York, I returned physically exhausted from the pace of the last four or five days of the itinerary.

I flew from Toulouse to Brussels on Monday afternoon (28 Sep), spent the night in Antwerp, and then caught the home team airline out of Brussels back to New York on Tuesday the 29th Sep. I returned to work on Wednesday the 30th.

Much more detail and a broader summary is forthcoming but I want to mention a few events before much more time passes.

I hesitate to isolate highlights or favor certain moments over others when reflecting on an adventure that generated so much in the way of “wow.” But on Friday the 25th, Sebastien and Julien invited me to join them for a day-long car excursion that took us north of Toulouse into several small but thriving French villages where medieval structures are set on gorgeous landscape covered with grape vines and now seasonally-expired sunflower plants.

We set off in Julien‘s 1979 Peugeot 604 a little after 1 PM. Julien is an extraordinary guy. A law school graduate with a disdain for the legal profession, he’s currently unemployed but wildly employable given his unique life skills, charisma and knowledge. Julien is a fan of Fidel Castro. He’s a self-taught auto mechanic and cobbler. And he knows a lot about French wine.

Sebastien is a huge rugby fan and works part-time at a university bookstore in Toulouse. Just about every time I met up with him during the week in Toulouse, he was glancing at a copy of L’Equipe, a daily newspaper devoted to sports. Like me, Sebastien has a keen interest in politics, public transit, sports and rock and roll. And beer.

So, there we were on a beautiful fall afternoon in the southwest corner of France tooling around in the 604. The side panels of the vehicle are about to rust off but the engine hums confidently and the frame is sturdy as can be. We’d stop off at little towns and walk around. All of them had at least one stunning church steeple, some sort of well-tended memorial to French soldiers and civilians killed in the World War(s) and a busy brasserie.

The two-lane roads connecting towns are in perfect condition. Great signage and smooth surfaces. When you leave a town, there’s a red diagonal line on the sign with the name of that town – signaling an exit from that boundary. Most of the season’s grapes had already been plucked but we saw a couple active efforts to harvest. There were no tourists to be seen although we all figured much of that had to do with the time of year.

The only visible gaudiness in the half-dozen small villages we visited was the sight of a McDonald’s and/or Subway franchise. No big deal really, though, because they were usually lumped in with other very limited schlock set apart from the predominant beauty.

The countryside was gorgeous. When we entered centers of towns, they were all immaculate and quiet with small groups of older citizens chit-chatting outdoors. At St. Sulpice la Pointe, we had lunch at L’Epi de Ble, a small bakery serving sandwiches and quiche. Each town had a staffed tourism office supplying maps and literature. The one at St. Sulpice is the place we picked up our map of the region.

The next stop was Gaillac which is kinda famous given the frequency its name appears on wine labels. We visited the local hub brasserie and marveled at the massive coffee machine. The proprietor told us it was an expensive Italian piece of hardware. It reflected the place’s devotion to quality joe which of course is a different presentation in France. I still prefer the tall cup of inconsistent American coffee but I now better understand you can enjoy the bean served in smaller, more pungent quantities. After Gaillac, we motored up to Castelnau du Montmiral, a beautiful, high-elevation “commune” with a population of about 1000. At the northern-most point of our trek we reached St. Antonin Noble-Val, another too beautiful to believe little town. Julien knew of a little bar on the L’Aveyron river so we ordered a bottle of the local product and sat there as the sun fell behind the mountain opposite our location. The lone staffer at Baranka Guingette de la Plage brought out some nibbles and we sipped the red. Wish we could have stayed longer but we were 100 KM from Toulouse and needed to start the return portion of the day trip.

Both Julien and Seb were in agreement as we traveled southbound that a stop in Cordes-sur-Ciel was mandatory. You could see Cordes from way out. It sticks straight up into the air. With the car parked on flat ground below the town, we started a steep climb up uneven, curvy streets to reach the top. The town is filled with 13th and 14th century buildings and you’re a thousand feet in the air at the top.

After soaking in the view, it was at the town’s peak that we entered Les Arcades, which was one of the few places open for a drink. We agreed the red wine was better there than in Noble-Val. It tasted a bit older if I were to try to explain it which I can’t do well when it comes to wine.

Our wine jaunt nightcap came at the bottom of the hill at Le Bistrot Cordais. We sat outside and celebrated the day with 1.5 Euro glasses of more great red. The small village French red wine buzz is the best.

When we got back to Toulouse, it was 2 AM. The bars close citywide at 2 AM so crowds were streaming into the streets making a ruckus. Julien and Seb have a favorite place where the door shutter goes down at 2 AM and the drinks keep flowing. I won’t name the joint to protect its continuing greatness but we took advantage on that night of extended hours. So extended that the sun was coming up as we finally walked out.

A few hours later, I was on the road with Jacques and Christophe headed for San Sebastian, Spain. Just three hours or so from Toulouse by car, San Sebastian (Donostia in Basque) is an incredibly beautiful ocean-side city with a totally different feel than France. It’s more relaxed I guess. Smaller than Toulouse. Just a couple hundred thousand people. People speak Spanish and Basque.

The weather is kinda like California’s except with a lot more rain. It was sunny and 70 the whole time we were there. A large cluster of businesses in the city’s center (or Old Quarter) are busy all the time it seems – serving plates of “Pinxtos” on the bar. The food is uncovered and includes all sorts of seafood and meat type snacks and mini-sandwiches. We had incredible marinated fresh anchovies on arrival which tasted great with a glass of Keler, the local lager. When you enter the bar, you ask for an empty plate. You serve yourself and the bartender rings you up based on your choices, usually a Euro or two for each snack.

Incredible olives and ham can be had along with fresh tuna creations. The signature scene in San Seb I guess (among many) is Urgull, the big hill in the middle of town topped by a giant statue of Jesus. Accessible by foot, you can go up there and enjoy several great vantage points of the city. Or I suppose, you could try to have a chat with the Almighty. We only stayed in San Sebastian for 24 hours, but we ate and drank cheaply and stayed in a motel that cost us 40 Euros each and got the job done. The day we left, Real Sociedad was playing Sevilla that night in San Sebastian. Fans wearing team jerseys were all over town. Just before leaving San Seb, Jacques took a dip in the ocean.

The drive back to France fell on the night of the Super Moon which we enjoyed about an hour before reaching Toulouse. To close out the Toulouse portion of my visit, a few friends came over and Jacques prepared dinner at his house. He served Saucisse de Toulouse, the local skinny link packed with flavor.

I left Toulouse the next day vowing to return again in 2016. One more post still to come with reflections on the 17-day Euro trip and then it’s back to reality.