Sunday, January 03, 2016
Hello!
I actually need to catch up on dinner last night, as it was
FABULOUS!
First, let me say that I
really love Indian cooking … and especially when there is
BOEUF on the menu!
(I know
it’s an oxymoron, but that doesn’t matter – beef cooked with Indian spices is
still wonderful.)
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| Chicken tika, samosas and pakora |
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| Boeuf curry! YUM! |
We went out about 7
p.m. to see if one of the three or four local Indian restaurants was open.
And, the one closest to us,
Lal Qila, was open, so in we went.
Lovely, small place, with an interesting décor
of Indian paneled wood on ancient Lyon stone, with a Christmas decoration or
two flung in along the way.
Very
fun.
We were able to get a nice table, and observed that in
addition to the restaurant, they also did carry-out, and the gal waiting for
food appeared to be Indian … we thought that was a good sign. We had a lovely bottle of Cotes du Rhone and
then our “usual” with some modifications.
We ordered the vegetable samosa,
along with pakora and chicken tika. We also got rice, garlic na’an and beef curry.
Wow! Everything was beautifully
presented, and very, very tastiful! And
for once in an Indian restaurant, we ordered just enough food, and not too
much, so (unfortunately) there were no leftovers to bring home. Hmmm… Finished up around 9 p.m. and had a
very short walk back to the flat.
I don’t think I’ve mentioned, but R figured out how we could
actually watch college football bowl games (and other things) on ESPN on the
computer. That has been great! So, unlike I had initially thought – I’d be
missing something like 42 bowl games, we were able to watch a handful – and, we
will be getting the national championship game on the 11th! Thank you, Robbie!!
We were able to watch some of a bowl game last night before
both of us retiring somewhere in the 10 pm timeframe. [One small problem: Live
sporting events in the U.S. occur at a very late hour on Central European
Time.] Obviously worn out from all the
walking around the Musee des Confluences!
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| Sunday craft market |
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| Place des Jacobins |
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| Ferris wheel... |
Up this morning about 6-ish, and while it was still very
dark outside, at least it looked like the streets were dry. In fact, while the craft fair was being set
up on the quai across the street, the sun actually came out making Robert ask: “What’s
that bright thing in the sky?” I told
him that, as an astronomer, he was supposed to know those things… Robert went
to Chez Jules for croissant and pain au chocolat, and we had a nice breakfast. (I did forget to mention that we had
purchased eggs at the market the other day, and still hadn’t used them. So, as Robert had picked up a jar of Mexican
Salsa, I turned the eggs into a large batch of scrambled eggs – and then I put
on the salsa … Uh oh! Believe it or not,
the salsa was actually SWEET! When R
read the ingredients list, sugar was something like the third or fourth
ingredient – but have you ever heard of such a thing?? YEK!
So…had to eat the eggs nonetheless, but that salsa is definitely going
to find its way into the trash can. What
a surprise!
Out about 10 am for a walk through the craft fair, and then
back to the apartment, as I was in need of warmer clothes. I added a cashmere sweater over my
turtleneck, and found my little red hat – which really helps keep my head warm!
This time, we went back to the C3/S1 bus stop, and took the
S1 for a change. We took this to Place des Jacobins, where there was a
beautiful square with stunning fountain in the middle. From there, we walked to Place des Celestins, where we originally stayed on our first trip
ever to Lyon, and found the hotel – 2** Hotel
du Theatre – and the entry way still looks as bad as it did those years
ago. I guess some things just never
change.
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| View to Fourviere |
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| Place Bellecoeur |
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| We're getting higher ... |
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| And I was definitely holding on! |
From there, we headed to Place
Bellecoeur, the main town square, and the home of a very large Ferris wheel
… which was operating and seemed to be without a LINE. So…have I ever mentioned that I am afraid of
heights??? On to the Ferris wheel we
went – it goes up 55 m (which is high, even if I can’t translate it into feet!)
[55 m = 180 feet - R] and into a circular little car with a bench seat all
around, and fully open to the outdoors.
(The London Eye, for example,
is actually an enclosed car.) So … up we
went – whew!! And I was absolutely SCARED to death! And not only did we go around once, we went
around FIVE times, until finally they
took pity on us and let us OUT! I have
to admit, when I could open my squinty little eyes, the view was fabulous – but
it was truly terrifying, and I basically clutched on to the center pole and
held on for dear life! Robert was
laughing so hard that he was making the little car bounce, which was also
upsetting! Good grief! And I paid for this??? [And, let me point
out, it was your idea – R]
From Bellecoeur,
we took the metro to City Hall (after recharging up our transport cards for
another week) and then started looking for a bus to Croix-Rousse. That was hard
to find the bus stop, but we finally found a C-13 which went all the way up
another hill to the top where we got off; Croix-Rousse
is atop a very high hill on the spit of land between the Saone and Rhone. A long rambling market was taking place on
one side of the street, and seemed to stretch for blocks and blocks. R thinks it was a big as the Sunday market at
Bastille in Paris, but as I pointed out to him, that one is not only long but
it’s five or six stalls wide as well!
As it was just about 12:30 p.m. we decided it was time for
lunch, and found Brasserie des Ecoles
on one of the corners of Croix-Rousse. It was crowded, but they found us a place in
a corner, which was quite lovely, as well as looking out into the square
itself.
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| Brasserie des Ecoles, Croix-Rousse |
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| R's salad |
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| My salad! |
They had a wonderful selection of salads.
I ordered a
Salade Lyonnaise, which had greens, cooked potatoes, tomatoes,
comte cheese,
lardons (bacon pieces) and croutons, as well as a poached egg in
the middle of it.
R’s
Salade Parisienne had hard boiled eggs,
potatoes, some wonderful ham, olives,
comte
cheese tomatoes and lettuce.
We both
finished every bite.
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| My profiterole -- wow! |
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| R's tarte tatin with cream |
For dessert, R had
a
tarte tatin (apple tarte) and I had
a
profiterole – a puff pastry with
vanilla ice cream in the middle, and wonderful hot dark chocolate sauce on top
and around … YUM!
After our repast, we decided to head downhill, starting with
one of the Traboules near Croix-Rousse. It was very interesting, and rather fun to
walk from one street to the next heading downhill and actually through
buildings! The buildings that housed the
thousands of automatic looms were huge, with very high windows for enough light
to ensure the proper selection of colors of silk. Many of these buildings are still there, but
have mostly been turned into apartments.
We finally decided to head (again downhill, which was nice!)
to the Jardin des Plantes, to see the
remains of a third Roman amphitheatre in Lyon.
This
particular amphitheatre is alleged to have been able to seat 20,000 people
after it was enlarged by Hadrian, and isn’t as old at the Odeon and
amphitheatre on
Fourviere hill.
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| Heading into a traboule! |
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| Had to have room for huge looms! |
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| Heading back into town. |
It’s also not in as good condition, as there
really isn’t much left to it.
However,
it was interesting to see and read about the history.
By this time, lunch and the thought of a nap overcame us,
and we caught an S6 bus down to the City Hall, and then found “our” favorite C3
and we were back at the flat in no time.
I think, as things are very quiet on the couch, that R may be sleeping
already … heading that way myself, so will close now!
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| What is left of Hadrian's amphitheatre |
Lots of love,
m
xxx
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