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Mary was disoncerted by the fact that my posts are out of order, so I was going to get all caught up and then post them in order, but that may take a long time, so I\u2019m just going to post as I write them. I wrote this one on Sunday, September 6:<\/p>\n\n\n\n
A lot of time has passed since my last blog post. It\u2019s all been sort of whirlwind and I was too tired to write, so I\u2019m dependent on my poor memory here.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
I had picked the Warwick Reine Astrid because it got good reviews and the room had a kitchen, which I thought we would appreciate after having been without a refrigerator for two weeks. I wouldn\u2019t stay there again. The service at the front desk and in the restaurant was excellent, but the room wasn\u2019t clean, the hallways smelled bad, and the pillows were these strange big lumpy things that felt a little like sleeping on a rock. The bed was on wheels and moved around. I opened the freezer once, saw hair in there, and decided not to open it again. The first night, I threw my shorts down on the floor and the next morning they were covered in dust. So, kind of gross. But it was extremely quiet (as was every hotel we stayed in this trip), and had nice big windows that let in the sun.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
On our first full day, after I had recharged my phone, we went to Les Halles de Lyon Paul Bocuse, which is a huge food hall with all sorts of specialized vendors. We had read and seen on YouTube that this was a must do. All the YouTube videos we saw showed a very crowded place, but that\u2019s because they were filmed in the morning. At 4 pm, half the stalls were closed and the place was mostly empty. There were multiple fromageries, patisserie\/boulangeries, and charcuteries. However, we were a little underwhelmed by the place. Mary wonders whether it is a tourist trap or we were just there at the wrong time. I think it was the latter, plus our moods. We bought three different cheeses, which were wrapped up in beautiful little packages, a loaf of bread, some raspberries, a pate in pastry slice for Mary, and I can\u2019t remember what else. Then we continued my weird manic search for ice cream (glac\u00e9 in French). I found a place that got good reviews so we took the bus there. It was closed, or no longer in business or something. I asked Google Maps if there was any other ice cream nearby and it took us to an area with lots of alley-like streets filled with restaurants, brasseries, bouchons, and people sitting outside eating and smoking. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
At the ice cream place, as I was looking at the flavors, a waiter insisted that we sit at a table that he led us to outside. One of the ironies of France is that I love eating outdoors and there is so much outdoor dining, but it is accompanied by constant smoking, which I didn\u2019t enjoy at all. So we sat outside, me masked up, and wondered why we weren\u2019t allowed to look at the flavors. Eventually I used Google Translate to ask if I could look at the flavors, and the waiter said, \u201cOf course,\u201d even though he seemed a bit annoyed by the request.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Eventually we ordered and ate very ordinary, honestly kind of disappointing ice cream. We took a different route back to the main street and passed at least two Glac\u00e9 shops that looked much better than the one we had just eaten at. Mary said we could have more ice cream if we wanted, but I was full and knew that even if it was better ice cream, it wouldn\u2019t be enjoyable. Plus what was this weird thing where I kept looking for the perfect ice cream? Especially since I might have already had it on the last day of the dragonboat festival.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Back at the hotel we talked about what we would do the next day, our last full day in Lyon. I particularly wanted to go to the Museum of Miniatures, and Mary wanted to go to the ancient theater, which is a Roman ruin, and to the Cathedrale Saint-Jean-Baptiste de Lyon, which is right next to the Museum of Miniatures. The plan was for me to go to my museum, while Mary would take the funicular up to the Basilica of Notre Dame of Fourvi\u00e8re, walk down to the Ruins from there, and then take the funicular back down to the Cathedrale.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Grand plans, but even as I was going to sleep I thought I was too tired to go to a museum and it would feel probably like a lot of the sightseeing we had done on this vacation where we had a very short stay in a city, tried to do some of \u201cthe things\u201d, and I ended up tired and cranky.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
In the morning I had no desire to go anywhere or do anything, so I lay around doing crossword puzzles and idly surfing the web with a bad internet connection that kept fading away and returning. After lunch, we decided to go to the Parc de la T\u00eate d\u2019Or, which was a block or so away from our hotel. I read that there was a lake, and a zoo, and botanical gardens. The park was quite grand with huge, tall gates, and we also passed some grand buildings on our way there. They looked like they were formally the residences of rich people and had been converted to apartments. When we got inside the park we immediately saw the lake, which was beautiful. There was a place where you could rent a pedal boat or an electric boat, or a pedicab to bicycle yourself and passengers through the park. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
I could not imagine pedaling a boat but definitely wanted to get out on that lake so we rented the electric boat, at the price of 30 euros for 30 minutes. Mary let me drive to start, which was not difficult, since the boat traveled at the rate of 1\/8 of a mile an hour. Mary was very afraid of my driving, which I think was just fine, especially since if we were going to crash into anything it would take at least 3 minutes to get to the thing we were going to crash into – plenty of time to right the boat. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
We drove around the edges of the lake. The park has paths and little places to sit all around the lake, and at one point there was someone playing a piano with a few people gathered to listen. We stopped the boat for a few minutes there. It felt very magical and I will attempt to attach a video Mary made. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
After our 30 minutes, we walked towards the zoo and, on the way there, passed a little cafe with seating next to the lake. Mary needed some caffeine and I was thirsty so we sat there and had a coke and a fancy water with ice. It was wonderfully serene.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
We continued our walk, and suddenly there were three or four giraffes in front of us, very close. They were in a wide open space with barriers but they chose to get very close to the people. I don\u2019t think I\u2019ve ever been so near a giraffe before and I really enjoyed their graceful physiques. They move very slowly, kind of like our boat, and were fun to watch. The zoo was free and we wandered through, enjoying,turtles, lemurs, a zebra, flamingos, and other animals I don\u2019t remember. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
We also passed quite a few places to buy ice cream, as well as a little amusement park for kids. One of the games involved choosing a rubber duck and getting a prize based on whatever is written on the bottom of the ducky. I remember how much I loved that carnival game when I was younger. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
After the zoo, which did not have a ton of animals, but seemed to have a lot of space for them to roam in, we went back the way we came and stopped to buy ice cream – vanilla\/strawberry soft-serve swirl, just like we had in Aix les Bains. We found a bench to sit on and watched the people walking by. It seemed to me that everyone spoke French and that this was more of a local park than a tourist attraction. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
On our walk back out of the park, we passed lots of families with young children, some kids playing futbal, and also a surprising number of teenagers, gathered in circles on the grass, smoking. I particularly enjoyed the teenagers for some reason. It was a lovely way to spend a few hours. We had a very good dinner at the Hotel Bar, and then packed up so we would be ready to catch an early train to Lille in the morning.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
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