Lyon

This weekend I had a four day weekend, and basically everyone in my program was jetting off to random places in Europe. So I went to Lyon, France with 3 friends! Very last minute planning was a little risky but it was perfect. Lyon is in southwest France, and about 5 hours from Paris. We left Friday night in a "covoiturage" which is a carpool that we found online; our best, cheapest option for planning it the day before. Our very professional french driver, the other two french people in the car with us decided it was a good time to solve all the worlds problems in the five hour trip to Lyon. Me being stuck in the back seat of a mini van with no food, book or phone, listening to very serious conversations in french about presidents, unemployment, taxes and more..safe to say it was the longest car ride of my life. But finally we arrived and the driver was nice enough to drop us at the door of our hotel, when he was originally supposed to drop us off at a Lyon train station which was about 15 miles from our hotel... So nice!!!! We stayed in an apartment style hotel, so it had two bedrooms, a kitchen and living room..very spacious and nice for an extremely cheap price. We were wondering what the catch was, why is this place so nice and so cheap?  We soon figured it out the next morning when we ventured into the city and realized how far we were from the main parts of Lyon. Which is okay, it took about 30-45 minutes to walk to the "action" of Lyon, but I didn't mind because that way we could see more. 

So. Lyon. Prior to arriving, we had researched a ton, so luckily we knew exactly where we were going and what we wanted to accomplish in the short weekend. One of the biggest things we learned is that Lyon has tons of markets! At home, I love farmers markets, so this was definitely my favorite part of the weekend. We basically had breakfast and lunch both Saturday and Sunday at markets throughout the city. 

so much cheese.

dried fruit and olives

BEST FRUIT I'VE EVER EATEN. That's saying a lot because I don't usually willingly eat/enjoy fruit. We bought a package of strawberries on Saturday morning for 1 euro. On sunday to take home, I bought 6 clementines for 1 euro, and 4 avocados for 2 euros. My friends also bought a plastic shopping bag full of apples for 1 euro, and a plastic shopping bag of blood oranges for 1 euro. Such a great place to buy the best fruit ever for super cheap!

Other than fruit, cheese and olives, the markets had tons of pastries, meats, fish, and jewelry. There were a few random stands of ready to eat food, so we also tried various pastries and also falafel at a greek stand. 

After the markets on Saturday morning, we were heading toward this church on a top of a big hill, basically the highest point in Lyon which was supposed to have a great look-out area. Lyon is surrounded by two main rivers: the Saone and the Rhône, so we were constantly walking along the water or seeing blue in the distance which definitely didn't have me complaining. 

View from the river, and also a view of our goal destination. The church in the far background is where we were headed!

After figuring how to get to top of the hill, we took our time in town, stopping in various shops and boutiques. Also, we unintentionally found one of our desired destinations, Vieux Lyon, (old Lyon) which was an adorable little village within the city filled with tiny shops, narrow cobblestone roads, and tons of wandering people.   

One of the many adorable streets in Vieux Lyon 

One of my favorite shops we found! Any kids dream. I filled a pretty big bag of candy and it only cost 1 euro. The tradeoff was feeling sick from all the sugar..

as you can see, I was enjoying myself

Once we got outside of Vieux Lyon, we found ourselves in the heart of Lyon, called Place Bellecour, which was basically just a big square with lots of benches, a playground, a ferries wheel, a couple places to get food, many statues, tourists and even a protest was happening as we entered. Having walked all morning, at this point we just took a second to take in the beauty of it all!

such a beautiful day

 Finally, after about another hour of walking and 20 flights of stairs, we were at the church at the top of the hill. I was literally panting and out of breath. But wow was it so worth it..

amazing views from up there

inside the church

view from the top of the one hundred trillion stairs we had to climb

After hanging out here for a while and enjoying the view, we were on our way to the next place: Amithéatre des Trois Gaules, an old roman amphitheater which was dedicated to cult of Rome and Augustus. 

This was incredible to see and experience. The history of this place was so moving and unlike anything I'd ever see. Especially for how different this was from what I had seen in Paris. Definitely a must-see and a favorite of mine. 

Next, was the most famous chocolate shop in Lyon, and a couple miles more up! Of course. Everything was up hills and stairs here. So once back in town, we of course had to do the french thing and take a much needed coffee break to reenergize. Finally getting the energy to continue upward, we left. And it really was a lot more stairs and hills. We had read that this chocolate shop was "worth the hike" so our fingers were crossed..and oh my god. It was. An hour later we were stuffing our faces with chocolate mousse, macaroons, caramel cream and more. 

yum. 

At this point, we had pretty much done everything we wanted to get done in the day and it was only about 4:30, so had lots of time until it was an acceptable time to eat dinner (for the french). Alors, (so) more wandering and exploring. I was so taken aback by the beauty of simple places like bus stops, banks and pharmacies. The architecture, detail and color of everything was amazing. So quaint and cute, and very different from Paris. Random thought, very few people spoke English here so that was an awesome change to speak french to someone and not have them respond in English.

After a couple more hours, we were literally defeated from all the walking, and it was time to choose a restaurant for dinner. We wanted to treat ourselves to something nice since we had been so money-conscious all weekend and had basically just snacked for breakfast and lunch. We went back to Vieux Lyon for dinner, because we had seen so many adorable, nice restaurants. Every place has their menu posted outside so that was nice, however finding the right place was very difficult. Cuisine Lyonnaise is very unique, but we were determined to try it! Most of the menus included entrees with stomach, liver, or guts. And I'm not adventurous enough for that…but finally we found a safe place!

A square in Vieux Lyon…it's hard to see but we ate dinner at the restaurant on the direct left of the tree. 

Dinner was amazing, and actually huge, so that was a really nice change to be full! We all chose to do a "formule" which is something almost every french restaurant offers..you choose an appetizer, an entree and a dessert for a fixed price. Two of my friends chose a more expensive one, so they had better options and huge salad at the start of their meal. 

My dinner: basically a whole french bread covered in cheese, ham, bacon, pesto and tomato

On Sunday, we were exhausted, so we had a slower day and it was perfect. It was about 58 degrees and sunny! Can you believe it! So many people were out, relaxing and doing nothing, I loved it. 

For breakfast, we took a risk and went into a Tunisian patisserie (pastry shop); by far the best pastries I've had! I had something that looked like a Fig Newton and was told it was filled with berries and dates, and I also had Turkish almond baklava. It was delicious, and I was stuffed.

baklava and an espresso

 After breakfast, we walked through a market again to buy some fruit to take home and for lunch, this was when I got the super cheap avocados and clementines. Unfortunately, they were too juicy and delicious to wait to bring them home, and I ended up eating all six in the day. After the market, we headed to our final destination. 

The book, Le Petit Prince, (in case you don't know, it's a very famous french children's book that philosophically teaches valuable lessons about friendship, loyalty and staying true to yourself) was written by Antoine de Saint-Exupéry and he was born in Lyon! So there is a statue of him and the little prince in Lyon! I was so excited!!! I read this book in high school and I also have a quote from it tattooed on my body, so it's safe to say it means a lot to me! 

the statue!

The quote I have as a tattoo!! I can't believe it was actually engraved here. Definitely a sentimental moment 

Having accomplished everything we wanted to see and do, we were feeling pretty good, and very exhausted. We sat in this square by the Saint-Exupéry statue for a good two hours, eating our fruit from the market and soaking up the sun. Guess what, my face got sun burn. 

It's definitely safe to say Lyon is amazing, and I couldn't have chosen a better weekend to go. It feels awesome to see more of France and simply be living my dream! I think the best part of it all was going back to Paris, and feeling like that was home <3