La Lumière à Lyon

Oh, Lyon, how sweet it is to see you again! We arrived Sunday night and will spend a (too short) week visiting our adopted home. We had ambitious ideas about squeezing in some day trips, but ultimately, we just want to BE here, enjoying our favorite things about our favorite city.

Monday, we walked down to Parc de la Tête d’Or, had a nice lunch near Brotteaux, made our way to Place de Bellecour, then returned to Croix Rousse via la montée de la Grande Côte. We walked nearly 10 miles and ended our day with a trip to Monoprix and a pint at Paddy’s with a friend. Life is good.

This may sound strange, but high on my list of “favorite things about Lyon” is the light. Paris may be France’s official “City of Light,” but the quality of la lumière in Lyon is pretty spectacular too. Here are some photos of our day:

Road Trip, France: Loire Valley

The final stop of our epic road trip was the lovely Loire Valley. I’d never been to this part of France, and was looking forward to sipping wine and visiting some chateaux. We arrived at Domaine des Thômeaux in the village of Mosnes Saturday evening, Bastille Day. The hotel is housed in a medieval mansion near the Loire river and just 15 minutes down the road from Amboise.

We were pleased to learn that we didn’t have to go anywhere to see the fireworks; they’d be visible from the yard outside the hotel’s bar. So, after a quick visit to the pool/spa and dinner at the hotel’s restaurant, we walked a few steps to our lounge chairs and enjoyed a short but sweet fireworks display.

Sunday, we visited two chateaux in Amboise, touring the home in which Leonardo DaVinci spent his final years and visiting his grave. The kids enjoyed seeing models of his inventions and wandering the grounds. We picked up some supplies for a picnic dinner at the hotel and headed back to the bar to watch France win the final game in the World Cup! After dinner, Luca and I took a (buggy) sunset walk to the banks of the Loire, passing through tiny Mosnes on our way. A perfect end to our tour de France!

Road Trip, France: Gouvets et ma famille française

Thursday morning, after a night at Saint-Michel, we set out for Gouvets in Basse-Normandie. Gouvets is a tiny rural village about 45 minutes from Caen. It’s beautiful, quaint, and so serene, but mostly it’s home to the Legrand family, the reasons I fell in love with France in the first place!

I was almost eighteen and had just graduated from high school when I first came to France as an AFS student in 1994. I spent almost a month in Normandy in the loving care of my host family, Annick, Bernard, Olivier, and Celine. Clearly, they made an impression on me, and I have loved them and France ever since. While I had made it back once for a visit and received two visits from Olivier, the years have gotten away from us and it had been close to 20 years since I had seen my dear French family.

I am so happy that I got a chance to visit during this trip and so grateful for the warm welcome extended to me and my family. Again, they took us in to their loving home, and we are all the better for it. Merci famille Legrand! Gros bisous!

Road Trip, France: Mont-Saint-Michel

Wednesday morning we left Bordeaux, driving north to Mont-Saint-Michel. I had been there nearly twenty years ago, and I knew that Cristian and the kids would love it. As I made plans, I saw that we would be arriving just days after the start of the summer light and sound show in the abbey (I tell you, the French love a good light show!).

After checking in to our hotel, we decided to have dinner before walking out to the Mont. We climbed and walked the ramparts after 9:00pm, stopping every few feet to enjoy the increasingly splendid views. If you decide to visit Mont-Saint-Michel during the busy summer months, go in the evening on a week day! There were no crowds at all, and we even had some stretches where we were all alone. The light show in the abbey was magical and we took our time to enjoy it, heading back to our hotel on the last shuttle at midnight.

Magical Mont-Saint-Michel:

Road Trip, France: Bordeaux via Carcassone

It was a long drive from Montpellier to Bordeaux, so we made the most of it, stopping at Carcassone for lunch. Carcassone is an impressive medieval fortified city, though it is overrun by tourists. We parked below, crossed the old bridge, and hiked up for a quick tour and some sandwiches before hitting the road again. It was worth the stop, but I didn’t really need more time there.

By the time we reached our hotel in Bordeaux, the kids were pretty much done with sightseeing. So, we made a compromise: they hit the pool and I ordered some wine and charcuterie at a table nearby. The bar was full of soccer fans watching the Demi finals, France vs Belgium, and I enjoyed a peaceful moment alone.

I eventually wrested the kids from the pool and convinced them to join me for a quick sightseeing expedition. We took the tram to Place de la Bourse, arriving just in time to catch the end of the game from the sidewalk outside a crowded pub. France a gagné, and the whole city broke out in celebration! Fans took to the streets with fireworks and flags and splashed in the fountain in their underwear. We took in the scene, then found a quiet bar to order some pizza. With all the madness, we weren’t sure we’d get a tram back to our hotel, but we eventually made it back!

Carcassone:

Bordeaux:

Road Trip, France: Montpellier via Aix-En-Provence

After Cannes, we headed to Montpellier, stopping in Aix-en-Provence for lunch. Both cities are beautiful, but our evening exploration of Montpellier was magical. We saw the Cathedral Saint Pierre, Palais du Peyrou, and Aqueduct Saint-Clément before finding a terrace to enjoy some tapas. Montpellier is a bustling, but laid back college town, and I hope to visit again some day.

Aix-en-Provence:

Montpellier:

Road Trip, France: Cannes

Our year in France is quickly coming to a close, but we thought we’d squeeze a little road trip in before we depart. I say “little,” but in fact we’re taking quite the tour in (probably) too little time!

We left Lyon Saturday morning, heading to the Côte d’Azur, and quickly realized we made a big mistake! It turns out that everyone else leaves town the first Saturday of school vacation too, and what should have been a 4.5 hour drive turned into 7 hours with long stretches of bumper to bumper traffic! Unfortunately, it also turns out that Cristian’s driver’s license has expired, meaning I will be doing all the driving on this trip…

We made it to Cannes eventually and enjoyed a late night trip to the beach and some people watching aLong the promenade after dinner. After spending so much time in the car, we decided to leave it parked Sunday, and took a ferry to Île Saint Honorat instead. It’s a tiny island just 15-20 minutes from Cannes by boat, and it’s home to a Benedictine abbey whose monks produce wine, liqueurs, and olive oil. We passed a lovely day there, exploring a crazy old fortified monastery and walking the trail that encircles the île. I even had one of the herbal liqueurs made on site as a digestif after lunch.

It was a very warm evening, and the sun is setting so late these days, so we still had plenty of beach time when we got back to Cannes around 6:00 pm! After another late dinner, we climbed up to the Église Notre Dame d’Esperance where we we rewarded with beautiful views of the city.

Enjoy our whirlwind tour of Cannes!

Another day, new montées

Today, for Father’s Day, we decided to try geocaching with the kids. Cristian got the app and we set off to search for hidden treasures. Our success rate was only about fifty percent, but the hunt was fun and it was a great way to explore the city! We did a lot of walking, including at least one new (to us) montée.

*What’s a montée? In this case, it refers to a sloped footpath connecting an elevated area to the street below. There are a lot of them in Lyon, but especially near us, as we live on a plateau that requires a steep climb to reach the rest of the city. Here are some shots from our day:

Happy Father’s Day from Lyon! ❤️❤️❤️

Weekend Adventures

I’m using the WordPress app to publish from my phone for the first time! I thought I would give it a try since WiFi can be so crappy here, and it might be nice to be able to post on the go as we try to squeeze in some more travel before leaving France at the end of July. I am not a fast texter, so we’ll see how it goes…

Last weekend, we rented a car and set off for the beach where we met our friends Sharon and Remy. We booked a six person cabin at Les Mediterranées in Marseillan Plage, just south of Montpellier, and it was great! The camping resort offers both traditional campsites and cabins, and has fun pools, a restaurant, bakery, and grocery store on site. We chose the latter and got a fully equipped 3 bedroom cabane just steps from the beach. That’s my kind of camping! The kids were in heaven going from beach to pool and left with wrinkled toes and fingers from a weekend spent in the water.

The weekend felt too short, and in fact, most guests at Les Méditerranées stay by the week. Next time….

We left Sunday afternoon, following pool time and pizza, and pulled off the highway in Nîmes with the intention of a quick visit of the Roman arena. We quickly fell in love with the town and ended up spending a few hours there, visiting the 2,000 year old temple and wandering its charming streets before grabbing dinner and getting back on the road.

It was getting late by the time we made it back to the autoroute, but we only had 2-2.5 hours left in our journey…so we thought. Not long after leaving Nîmes, we heard the telltale rumbling of a flat tire! We managed to pull off the road at an SOS box where we waited on the other side of the barrier for a tow truck to arrive and tow us to the garage. He didn’t have a tire for our car, so we spent the night in a nearby hotel.

Monday morning, the rental company sent a tow truck to take the car to their own garage and a taxi to take us to the nearest Avis office where we picked up a replacement car to drive back to Lyon. Whew. A little hiccup in our trip, and a missed day of school for the kids, but we made the most of it. We stopped in Valence for lunch and took a little walk through its lovely Parc Jouvet.

Overall, another fun weekend exploring! I’ve decided that I love Provence…the light, the air, the fields of lavender and poppy. I’m looking forward to seeing more during our big road trip next month!

Parc de la Tête d’Or

We only have two months left in France, and I am already starting to think about the things I will miss. We’ll miss our new friends and our little village on the hill, the daily market and fresh baguettes, four distinct seasons and the accompanying changes in light and foliage. Near weekly festivals and fairs, sunny terraces and patios packed with locals enjoying an afternoon pint, parks and playgrounds tucked into every neighborhood…. Life is good in Lyon.

There are so many beautiful spots in this city, and in France in general, but one place I’ll miss in particular is Parc de la Tête d’Or. This urban park covers nearly 300 acres and includes a lake, beautiful Victorian greenhouses, botanical gardens, a zoo, and more. We have enjoyed walking through the park in all seasons, watching the leaves change and fall, and reappear. Every time I felt a noticeable seasonal shift, I headed there, knowing it would present some new wonders. Here’s a look at Tête d’Or last week…

The next few weeks will be busy as we try to squeeze as much as we can from our time left in France, but we will make time for a few more strolls through our favorite park.

xoxo