A Weekend in Lyon

View of La Basillique de Notre Dame from La Rive Saone

Well, I'm sure most of you were wondering where I've been for the past week or so and to tell you the truth, I meant to write this blog post earlier in the week but the Internet connection in my room is not really all that stable and from previous experiences, attempting to write a meaningful post and include photos while dealing with a poor connection is very frustrating. So, in a nutshell, that's why I'm writing this post today, although like the old adage goes, better late than never.

Last weekend, a group of us decided to go check out Lyon and I must say that this was a great decision. Lyon is roughly a 2 hour train ride from Geneva so we all met up at the main train station in Geneva, Gare Cornavin, after work, ready for a fantastic French experience. We arrived in Lyon late Friday evening and after setting our things down at our hostel, we went out to explore briefly. Fortunately most of us were pretty exhausted from  a long work week and we decided to turn in after an hour of exploring so that we could get the most out of our weekend.

We started our Saturday off right with a nice little breakfast from a sidewalk boulangerie/patisserie. I had a quiche that had tomatoes, eggplant, and mushrooms and a giant pistachio macaroon (my first proper French macaron). Needless to say I was on a sugar rush for the rest of the day. I don't know how Manischewitz gets away with calling those Passover cookies "macaroons;" ingenious marketing move I suppose but nothing compared to the real deal. 

After a breakfast of this magnitude we decided as a group that we needed to do a lot of walking to get our bodies back on even keel, a theme that would repeat itself for most of the 40 hours we spent in Lyon. For those that don't know, outside of Paris, Lyon is considered the capital of French gastronomy so needless to say we indulged just a little bit over the weekend. It was nice to discover that really good meals are pretty affordable in Lyon, which is quite a difference from Geneva.  Now, let me get back to the weekend...From breakfast we walked up to the Place Bellecour and then down to the Saone river. The area of Lyon that we were staying in is a peninsula split by the Saone and Rhone rivers (French speakers forgive me, I'm typing this on my Dell so now French accent keys, although I am getting used to my Swiss keyboard at work!) so we got a nice view of both riverbanks. We walked along Quai St. Antoine to a nice Saturday market that had plenty of goodies.

After taking in the sights and smells of the market, we crossed over the Saone to Vieux Lyon, where we spent the rest of the morning and also had lunch. The difference between Vieux Lyon and modern Lyon is incredible and I'm amazed at how well maintained Vieux Lyon is. Our first destination upon setting foot in Vieux Lyon was the Cathedrale Saint-Jean, which was built on Roman ruins very close to the riverbank. As you can probably tell from the majority of my photos, the weather in Lyon was absolutely beautiful all weekend long but it was also extremely sunny which means that there were some exposure issues in some of the photos.

The front of the Cathedrale Saint-Jean

The cathedral was built sometime in the 15th century and has some pretty neat history (look at the photos in my album from Lyon for more detail). From the cathedral we chose to trek up the hill to get to La Basillique Notre Dame de Fourviere rather than take the cable car up. The journey up was intense, but well worth it given the views we were able to take in. The photo below is a panorama of the view of modern Lyon from the hill.

The Basillica was also quite impressive and similar to the Cathedral, was also completed in the 15th century and is quite immaculate. There are plenty of pictures in my album of the insides so I'll spare the details because words won't do it justice. From La Basillique we made our way over to the ruins of a large Roman amphitheatre and again, I was just amazed at the condition that the ruins are in. Even more interesting is that the city of Lyon uses the ruins to stage concerts and other events during the summer, which is very cool. Take a look for yourselves.

After spending most of the morning out in the sun trekking about in Vieux Lyon, we needed some nourishment. Luckily for us, there is no shortage of cafes in Lyon, especially Vieux Lyon, so once we had descended back into the town, we promptly found a place to sit and relax and enjoy a good meal. Many of the cafes in the area had special prix fixe menus starting at 15 euros, which I thought was a pretty good deal. I started off with la salade Lyonnaise, which consisted of greens, croutons, a poached egg, and bacon in a lite dressing. For my main course I had a lemon chicken dish with rice and some greens in a citrus vinaigrette and for dessert I had a slice of apple-rhubarb pie.

In typical Lyon fashion, this lunch took about two hours and it was nice to just sit and take in the atmosphere while people watching. After coming out of our food comas, we made our way back across the Saone in search of some gourmet chocolate, which we were successful in finding and it was delicious as well. The chocolate gave us some renewed energy and we made our way to the Hotel-de-Ville aka the city center of Lyon. As it so happened, there was a big Pride parade taking place on the same day and our timing was impeccable as we got swept into the frenzy for a few blocks before jumping out of line to take another break. 

By this point in the day, we all decided that we should probably make our way back to our hostel to clean up for dinner, which we had at a restaurant recommended to me by my supervisor at work. The restaurant, Le Sud, is one of four relatively well-priced brasseries run by Lyon's most famous chef, Paul Bocuse. Again they had a prix fixe menu which was what I went with. I started with a chilled dish of pureed eggplant and spinach and then had a Moroccan style lamb dish served on a bed of couscous with a side of potatoes. As was expected, the food was quite good, have a look for yourselves.

After dinner we went and explored Lyon's nightlife for a while and then called it a night. We woke up a little later on Sunday and as is typical in many European cities, we weren't missing much since most shops, etc... are closed. We were able to partake in market life once again and the markets did not disappoint. We spent the remaining hours wandering around Lyon, stopping for lunch at a place that specializes in moules frites. Needless to say, I was more than happy to partake in the house specialty. All in all it was the perfect way to cap off a great weekend of gastronomy and sightseeing in a great city and I'm already looking forward to a return visit sometime in the future.

What I'm listening to: "Stranger in a Strange Land" - Leon Russell and the Shelter People

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ESVMmyRdjlA

Lounging in Lutry

View from the Lutry pier of Lac Leman and the Alps

I apologize for the lack of writing in the last week or so, I've had some longer days at work and unfortunately the Internet wifi connection back in my room is just okay and nothing special compared to what I had when I was living in Korea or back home. I also wanted to make sure that I had enough to write about.

Having written all that here's a little update on the last two weeks of my time in Geneva. My second weekend here those of us in the program that had already arrived were taken over the border to France for some less expensive groceries (somewhat debatable but the selection was great) by Werner. Part of me thinks that we all trick ourselves into thinking it's less expensive since prices are in Euros and not in Swiss Francs. Anyways I was able to get some essentials and some pretty tasty microwaveable dishes since the microwave back at the Centre is the extent of the cooking appliances at our disposal. After grocery shopping at Migros we took a route through some smaller villages back into Switzerland to avoid the customs officials and ended up on the other side of the Rhone river in a little village called Dardagny where we stopped for un peu de cafe. From Dardagny we made our way back to the Centre with plenty of groceries in tow. For those who are interested here is a map with our route: https://maps.google.com/maps?saddr=Chemin+des+Cr%C3%AAts-de-Pregny+27,+Pregny-Chamb%C3%A9sy,+Switzerland&daddr=Migros,+CC+Val+Thoiry,+Thoiry,+France+to:Auberge+de+Dardagn+Restaurant,+Route+du+Mandement+504,+Dardagny,+Switzerland+to:Chemin+des+Cr%C3%AAts-de-Pregny+27,+Pregny-Chamb%C3%A9sy,+Switzerland&hl=en&ie=UTF8&sll=37.0625,-95.677068&sspn=41.546728,79.013672&geocode=FcGAwQIdEpddACk7d3gx9mSMRzHQsL8vDJLITg%3BFa1lwQIdEnBbACEmpLtE0mDkKCkR28N4WoiMRzEmpLtE0mDkKA%3BFU3awAIdw3xbACHRrnQ5gmnnmimXBPqt8YeMRzHRrnQ5gmnnmg%3BFcGAwQIdEpddACk7d3gx9mSMRzHQsL8vDJLITg&oq=Che&mra=ls&t=m&z=12.

The past week of work was pretty busy and as a result I didn't do too much Monday-Friday. On Friday night a few of us decided to go out for a little bit and we ended up as spectators at a genuine European freak show. This troupe was performing outside of a little bar in a fairly residential area and unfortunately the pictures I took on my phone were not great so hopefully my words will do their act justice. These performers  did a little bit of everything, from lying on a bed of nails to fire-eating to smashing plates and it was all accompanied by some lovely accordion music...only in Europe. After the show we figured it was probably better just to call it a night before anything else to strange took place.

Yesterday a group of us decided to take a spur-of-the-moment trip to Lausanne by train, which is roughly 50 minutes away. The scenery was beautiful on the ride there as you pass alongside the Alps and Lake Geneva. When we arrived in Lausanne we walked around for a bit before deciding to stop for some amazing gelato, which was a nice refreshment given the nice weather we had. After a little more walking around Lausanne we hopped aboard a bus and headed out to Lutry, which is a little village 15-20 minutes from Lausanne. Lutry is known for its vineyards, which are a UNESCO World Heritage Site. We had decided before going to Lutry that we would take the evening trolley ride through the vineyards so we spent the rest of the afternoon hanging out at the pier since Lutry is situated right on Lac Leman.

Here was our view:

It was a little humid and muggy down on the lake, hence the fog, but it really was quite scenic with the Alps in the background. There were also numerous sailboats anchored in the harbor and it felt a little like I was strolling along at the Yacht Club in search of the Rayzel.

After grabbing a bite to eat we hopped aboard the Lavaux Express, our evening trolley ride up into the vineyards. As fate would have it the weather was pretty decent on the way up and the views were spectacular but it started to downpour as we were on our descent and our poor driver got soaked. Unfortunately he had to cut our trip short but we were promptly dropped off at the wine bar where we were able to sample a few of the wines produced from the vineyards we had driven past, including a white, a rose, and a red.

A view of the vineyards and the impending weather

View of the vineyards, Lac Leman, and the Alps

The town of Lutry from the vineyards

Thankfully we really didn't get stranded in the rain for very long and we made it back to Lausanne at a decent hour and took the train back to Geneva to end a nice day trip. Today a few of us went to go check out the International Committee of the Red Cross and Red Crescent's museum, which was interesting, pretty interactive, but a little expensive at 15 Francs. 

That's about all for now, it should be another relatively busy week at work but stay tuned because there is strong possibility that a group of us will be going to Lyon next weekend and I'm sure I'll have plenty to write about and many pictures of delicious foods.

What I'm listening to: "Dig A Pony" - The Beatles

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vfK67uzz83o