Saturday in Lyon

My French teacher in 9th grade was from Lyon, and after knowing her I was fairly positive that I never wanted to go to the place that she came from. She was not particularly mean, or nice for that matter, she just had a certain kind of craziness about her that could only be blamed on her town, where most certainly everyone else would be the same.  Thankfully, I have accepted my own kind of crazy, and was confident that going to Lyon could not possibly have a negative effect. Saturday I was able to test my hypothesis and I am certainly glad I did, the day was wonderful. I was accompanied by four other girls (the usual Kathleen and Marryn) and two others that are just as lovely Emily, a fellow Atlantan, and Vanessa, from British Columbia.  We started our day by going to the "parc de la tete d'or" and having a picnic of that's right you guessed it, cheese and baguette, and to stay on the healthy side Emily grabbed some apples, and thank goodness she did, I had forgotten how great they are with cheese!

This is where we entered the park, I for one was very impressed and satisfied with the regality of the entrance, then Kathleen said "Wait until you see the main entrance!" 

One of the fierce lion details on the gate.

As if the gate wasn't enough, this park has a zoo, this reindeer saw the cameras and came to pose almost immediately. I was a bit worried that the French hadn't been informed about reindeers ability to fly for this zoo didn't have any kind of guard above deer. Maybe they add that around Christmas...

Emily and Vanessa holding our picnic supplies as we wait for Marryn and Kathleen to come with the baguettes.

The ladies enjoying our lunch.

dun dun dun dunnnn!! Kathleen was right, it did get better.

Emily and I standing by the bigger and better gate.

At this point in the day I was starting to get the idea that Lyon is the quintessential French city, without being Paris.

We took a bus to this square with a ferris wheel, straight ahead of us was one of the rivers, and to the left of us was a protest of some sort.

This is the interior of the St. Jean Cathedral, the outside was under repair so it was covered completely in scaffolding.

This is one of the most impressive things I have seen since I got here, it is an astronomical clock from the 14th century, it goes of at 12:00, 2:00, 3:00, and 4:00. We had no idea of its time schedule and managed to get there just in time for the 4:00 show. After the rooster on top crowed a few times all of the people began to move, God even started waving.  I no longer wonder where Disney got its inspiration for rides.

The building on the hill was our ultimate destination for the day La Basilique Notre-Dame de Fourviere. Inside is almost a complete mosaic.

View from the bridge on our way to the Basilique.

This is the funicular a part of the public transportation system in Lyon that takes you up a mountain, we got off and walked directly into Roman ruins.

At this point my camera lost battery, I forgot to recharge after Portugal.  I took Marryns camera to take pictures, she will be sending them to me later on this week, at which point I might do a second post about Lyon.  

Until then, I feel absolutely compelled to talk about our dinner that night.  We searched all over for a restaurant with a vegetarian option, it took a while. We walked up to a restaurant with a vegetarian option and the man threw in a free apperatif, so we were in, just in time too because after we were seated the waiters were turning people down, suckers!

As we were enjoying our free apperatifs, one of our three waiters came by with shot glasses full of butternut squash soup, we were off to a great start. Then I saw on the vegetarian menu Creme brulee au chevre, which is goat cheese creme brulee, I had never heard of it either it had delicious roasted tomatoes on the bottom and the entire thing was absolutely delectable and I will be attempting to recreate it the second I get my hands on a blow torch, the sugar with the goat cheese was perfect.  As a second course I stuck to the theme and got goat cheese gnocchi, and Emily and I split Fondant au chocolat and real creme brulee for dessert.  I do not think I have ever had such a wonderful meal.  I will be going back there before I leave France.