Toulouse Travel Forum

Somewhere between Agen and Toulouse, France, there is a paved bike path that
goes into center of Toulouse. Where does this paved path begin and where
does iit end in Toulouse? Is this the best way for a cyclist to pass though
Toulouse leading onto the paved 55 kms bike beside the Canal du Midi that
eventually lands up in the Med?
Thanks for your help.

Anita,
The Canal du Midi is a beautiful place to bike on; I do not know the “chemin de halage” (trailing path) north of Toulouse (your route), but I guess, it is the same as south of Toulouse.
A website tells about that trail and they publicise for a guide (paper book!) about biking along canal du Midi between Bordeaux and Toulouse: http://toulousevelo.free.fr/spip.php?article325
Lots of other info in the website.
You can download quite detailed map (enlarge it!) of Toulouse and area with all biking tracks through the city.
Map: http://www.grandtoulouse.org/admincomplement/actualite/repertoire/ficNX-cartepistescyclables.pdf
Bon voyage, and happy biking!

Most probably I cannot answer your question to your total satisfaction because I have not cycled in this region.

But if no other VT member can tell you about his own experience, perhaps this helps:

In some descriptions of bike tours I read that they start the trips in Toulouse, heading east, at Ponts Jumeaux, rive droite. And there are some more descriptions about tours through Agen.

Do you speak French to understand them?

Here would be one link:
www.canalmidi.com/vtt.html

From there I clicked further and found other sites with maps.

But if you go to www.googlemaps.com and just type "Ponts Jumeaux, Toulouse, France" you find this bridge (Ponts Jumeaux = Twin Bridges) which they take as starting point of the above mentioned trip along the Canal du Midi. From there you can follow up the canal to the north, and later on continue along the Garonne river and finally end up in Agen.

On a German website I read that there is a 40 km bike track starting west of Toulouse and leading through Toulouse, along the Garonne and the Canal du Midi. West of Toulouse it is the Canal Latéral à la Garonne. It starts right after the town of Grisolles.

Perhaps this helps for a start. And if nobody else can give you more details you can always contact the tourist office in Toulouse:

http://www.toulouse-tourisme.com/accueil/index_fr.php

Thank you Kokoyko and Kakapo. It is actually a friend of mine who is heading out on a one month bike trip. He has the whole trip pretty well planned it is just this one section he's having trouble figuring out. I have biked myself years ago along the Canal du Midi and it is truly lovely. Thanks for your information. I have passed it along. I am hoping also to hear from someone who has biked this section.

If you wanted to, you could take the old towing path along the Canal du Midi from Toulouse all the way west to Béziers. It's generally a very good and serviceable path but I don't remember how much is actually paved. There are places to stop; restaurants, some B&Bs (actually converted old barges), and good facilities all along the canal which is still in service but mostly for tourism.

These sites may help:

http://www.canal-du-midi.org/
http://www.lecanaldumidi.com/