A Touch of Italy in Lyon.

Over Easter weekend, Marco and I went to Lyon to visit his aunt, uncle, cousins, his brother, and his girlfriend. It was a great four days of exploring and being spoiled by his family! Here are some pictures of our trip:

This is the Notre-Dame de Fourviere Basilica. It is beautiful from the outside but extremely gaudy on the inside.

The basilica is at the top of a hill that looks over the city. At night, the basilica is light up and looks magnificent. This is part of the view you can see from the outside of the church.

Not far from the basilica, are some ancient Roman ruins. Lyon was founded by the Romans in 43 BC and was named Lugdunon ('Hill of Lights'). Concerts are still held at this amphitheater in the summer.

Half way down the hill, is the St. Jean Cathedral. The cathedral itself is okay but what was the most eye-catching was the light coming through the stained glass windows. We picked the perfect time to go. All of the colors and streams of light were breath taking.

This is to show how Lyon looks like Italy. Many of the buildings are in browns, oranges, yellows, and terracotta colors. This is is a stark contrast from Nantes' mostly gray and white buildings. Another nice thing about Lyon is that the city was not destroyed during WWII, thus meaning that many of the buildings are originals.

We were fortunate to have wonderful weather so we walked around quite a bit. Lyon is between two rivers - Le Rhone and La Saone. On the banks of the Rhone there is a large boardwalk. There are lots of boats along the bank of the river that serve as cafes or bars that we can access from the boardwalk.

The Opera National de Lyon (built in 1831) with flowering trees around it.

This is Lyon's 17th century town hall. It looked beautiful at this hour.

Marco's aunt made us lunch and dinner every single day. She put so much effort into being a good hostess. On Easter Monday we had 2 large meals with everyone from Marco's family that was in Lyon. It was delicious!

Between the 2 meals, all of us went to the famous Tete d'Or Park ('Head of Gold'). The park is huge and has lots of different greenhouses, little restaurants, stands, sports fields etc. It was packed when we were there. We escaped into one of the greenhouses for a bit.

There is also a zoo in the park. We saw flamingos, giraffes, herons, elephants, monkeys, porcupines and many other animals. The most fun was watching the monkeys show off for all the humans :).

A picture of me, Marco's aunt (Beurge), Lily (Marco's brother's girlfriend), Camille (Marco's brother), and Alexis (a cousin).

Well, there is a little bit about my trip to Lyon! I leave for Marseille on Saturday so I will update with pictures of Mathilde and me next Wednesday.

Here is the Wikipedia link for Lyon if you want to learn more about the city: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lyon