Lyon

After another tiring week, chloe and I decided to spend the day in Lyon. We got up late, drove in to the center and parked in the lot under Place Antonin Poncet (15 euro for the day). Neither chloe nor I had ever walked up to the Basilique Notre Dame, so we made our way through the Place Bellecour, alon the quai and across the footbridge and into Vieux Lyon. We had a big tapas lunch at Cafe Sol on Rue du Boeuf, and then walked up the stairs and gardens to the basilica. As we were looking out over Grenoble, Chloe and I simultaneously wondered aloud what the big hangar shaped building was. As we walked up to the map, two french girls came running up and said "Alors, CA, CA C'est l'opera!!" while pointing at the hangar shaped building on the map. So yes, it was the opera building. We walked down the long steps that end up at the Gare St. Paul, and wandered around looking for the much talked about "Traboules" (secret passages). We found the one that begins at the quai, and were pretty underwhelmed. I guess we were expecting a catacomb-esque passageway. The door to the one on rue du Boeuf was locked, but had a little plaque saying something about Traboules. We began walking back towards the rive Gauche and au-vieux-campeur (a wonderful outdoor shop: like REI but staffed with people who actually know what they are talking about), but were stopped by the sight of two shrieking college students. They were on the Pont Alphonse Juin, pointing north at the river, waiting, and periodically bursting into shrieks and giggles. We looked out onto the river, but there was nothing: not so much as a boat. In fact, the only thing on the river at all was a dirty and disheveled swan about a half kilometer up the river. Surely this was no cause for excitement. Then, all of a sudden, a diving duck of some kind popped to the surface with a small squirming fish harpooned on its beak! It shook its head a bit, then neatly tossed the fish into its mouth, swallowed it, then
disappeared again. This went on for several fish. It was very impressive, although sushi from the Saone strikes me as a bit unsanitary. Anyway, we went on to vieux-campeur and bought a helmet and some new shoes for our upcoming Kalymnos climbing trip. Along the way we stopped in at a store that was selling Apple Cinema Displays, and chloe had to drag me away from them. I think I left a little pool of drool on the floor on my way out. I forgot to mention that the main reason we were in Lyon was because we had reservations at "Le Sud", but we still had 4 hours to kill before dinner. After dropping off our booty at the car, we went back to Vieux Lyon and sat at a cafe in Place St. Jean for a long, long, looong time. A man was smoking a cigar nearby which cleared out the customers pretty quickly. After hours of sitting around, we still had two more hours before dinner, so we went to possibly the worst movie I have seen in recent history: Trouble. But hey, it was in french and I understood everything except the profound whisperings. Its key feature was that it was about an hour and a half long, so by the time we were finished being dragged through the immense bubbling pool of crap that was "Trouble", we were ready for our dinner. Le Sud wasn't as good as we had remembered, but I think its because we made the mistake of ordering the "Menu". It was a great day in Lyon, and we'll have to got back soon. I think I'd like to try a new restaurant next time, though.