TOULOUSE TO LOURDES & BIELSA – Stars, Sacred Sites & a Road Between Worlds
Jun 23, 2025
Some chapters unfold like stories. Others feel like visions. This leg of the Euro Book Trek was a bit of both.
From the vibrant streets of Toulouse to the mountain shadows of Bielsa, this stretch was soaked in the surreal, the sacred, and the speculative. Along with my wife Sara and my son Harrison, I went to stay with my old friend Chris Rosings, former editor of OVNIS — the popular French UFO magazine that once featured my son and I years ago. Chris is one of the most curious, sharp-minded people I know — and she was keen to show us the sights of her home town and surounding area. This journey was, in many ways, an opportunity for Chris and Harry to continue the conversation they started when he was only 14, about the many unexplained mysteries of Europe
📍 Places Visited
Toulouse: A beautiful, warm city of art, fashion, and science — ancient streets humming with creative enterprises. While Chris showed Sara and Harrison around town, I visited Cité de l’Espace, a huge space-themed discovery park. Toulouse is known as the European Capital of Space, home to Airbus — and a very big rocket.
Here, inspiration for sci-fi writing was everywhere. Earth observation, planetary resilience, and space-enabled conservation projects all echoed my character Rowan’s work in Salt & Seeds — mapping the climate-battered terrain of a future Earth from above. The VEGA rocket model was also on display, and I couldn’t help thinking that my character Vega would’ve loved seeing it. I felt proud to still be working in the space sector on Earth preservation initiatives, and treated myself to a new ESA patch.
This city makes you think forward. After so many reflections on memory and war in Normandy, Toulouse felt like standing on a launchpad — not just for rockets, but for imagination.
Later that day, I joined Chris and my family in the city centre for excellent food and a tour of the wonderful bookshops and galleries. A great example is The Bookshop — with a well-curated stock of English language books, and now a signed copy of Salt & Seeds on its shelf.
Lourdes: A place of devotion, healing, and deep mystery. We stopped here with Chris on our way to the mountains. We drank from the holy spring, visited the grotto, and watched monks, nuns, and other pilgrims move like quiet currents through the sanctuaries.
Lourdes is not just about miracles — it’s also about resilience through ritual. The town has a complex relationship with flooding, having faced several devastating deluges in recent years. And yet, it rebuilds again and again, with faith and sandbags. There’s valuable experience here.
The Pyrenees & the Bielsa Pass: We crossed into Spain through the Tunnel de Bielsa, emerging into sweeping Pyrenean wilderness. The magnificent snow-capped peaks contrasted with the warm sunlit ground in the beautiful clearing where we stopped to stretch our legs. Local cows, big-belled and friendly, grazed calmly nearby with their calves — curious, not protective.
That night we had a delicious meal in Bielsa, where I left bookmarks, then drove back through winding mountain roads. A beautiful deer ran beside our car for several long moments, as if guiding us back to the border.
The road was winding and long. It felt like moving through a dream. Like the forest itself was aware of us.
🌍 Climate & Resilience Insight
Toulouse isn’t just a city of aerospace — it’s a city thinking about survival. Its research centres study not only satellites and rocketry, but also urban sustainability, water systems, and climate resilience. ESA’s Earth observation programs are already being used to monitor deforestation, ocean temperatures, and agricultural shifts — the very technologies I work with in GalacticESG, and the inspiration for what my character Rowan uses in Salt & Seeds to interpret planetary signals from orbit.
In contrast, Lourdes faces rising climate pressure with very human tools — cooperation, community, ritual. The 2013 and 2018 floods shut down pilgrimage sites and displaced residents. Now, improved flood defences and real-time monitoring protect the sacred grotto. It’s a blend of ancient belief and modern adaptation — in the face of warming air and heavier storms.
In the Pyrenees, climate change brings a different pressure: earlier snowmelt, shifting ecosystems, and wildlife migrating higher. Sacred or not, the mountains are changing too.
📚 Literary Sparks
Toulouse turned out to be more than a stop — it became a creative ignition point. Chris offered to translate Salt & Seeds into Spanish, and introduced me to a friend interested in creating a graphic novel adaptation. The story is growing — not just in space, but in form.
We also spent time exploring local bookshops and galleries. Salt & Seeds found kindred company in Toulouse, stories about possible futures, wild hope, and strange new worlds were welcomed with warmth and enthusiasm.
📘 Book Drops
- Book in The Bookshop, Toulouse
- Book to my dear friend Chris to pass on once she’s read it
- Bookmarks in Bédéciné Bookshop, Toulouse
- Bookmarks in Ombres Blanches Bookshop, Toulouse
- Bookmarks in Bielsa and Lourdes information areas
🌱 Closing Thought
This leg reminded me that speculative fiction doesn’t always begin in the mind — sometimes it begins in the body, in landscape, in stories whispered in chapels or tracked in satellite orbits. It was a journey through outer space and inner signal, through pilgrimage and possibility.
Next stop: Provence to Nice — ochre cliffs, lavender dreams, resistance villages, and the ancient beauty of churches on hilltops.
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