Lyon, France

I'm really happy that I've managed to finish CTM a day earlier. The feeling of relieve when I handed it in made all the hard work worth it. Don't worry, I still haven't forgotten about my other work like PBL and SSM 5 proposal yet. Just needed a small break before getting a start on it.

To continue where i left off about Lyon.

I am really bad with names regardless of people or places. So, bear with me if I don't mention some of the names of famous places.

We made our way toward the city centre and went hunting for the tourist information centre which is the first place I always search for whenever I go travelling to a new place. There was a ferris wheel next to it when we got there. The statue of King Lovis the XIV was there as well. Before approaching and knowing that it was King Lovis's statue, we just took a photo of it from far as it was all shown in the Lyon map. We do practice the policy of 'take the picture first, find out about it later'.


I mentioned about taking the furnicular up the mountain to reach the hugh cathedral. Posted the photos here.



We went down to the old town after that. It is a very orange and yellow town. The unique thing about Lyon is that there are bicycles for rent practically everywhere!


You just need to pay a small charge using credit card before you can rent the bicycle. Talking about bicycles, I still remember the 10 hours of cycling in Amsterdam during my easter trip in first year. Might blog about it next time when I'm free. I think those who were involved in the trip has developed bicycle phobia. Anyone knows what phobia is this called?
Souvenirs! See the shop on the right, that was where I bought my postcards from. Bought a few other items as well.Real or unreal. It looked too real to be true. (Looks closer) It is real! Just that it is really tiny in size. Took this photo outside the Miniature Museum. You'll be surprised at the actual size of it.

Guignol, the famous pupet which originated from Lyon. We did visit the museum after paying 5 euro for it.It was really dark inside. With all the liveless pupets around, it was more scary than entertaining.


FoodWas really hungry even before starting to explore the old town. Pei Pei treated us to pizza which she bought from one of the really crowded pastries shop situated at a corner. As usual, we would borrow the food to take photo first before eating it. Really delicious, especially when you're starving.

Next stop was at a proper restaurant. We were quite disappointed that the food at UCPA (our ski resort) was so much nicer compared to this restaurant. What to do, we have been pampered for a week with delicious food cooked by a ex-4 star hotel cook.I ordered spicy chicken with rice and Menaka ordered lamp chop. However, the highlight of the day was:He was practically a tourist attraction. We were all amazed at his skills of carrying, I estimate, around 50 wine glasses at a time! He was the one who attended our table.

Due to communication barrier, we had some trouble ordering. To my amusement, when we came to ordering our dessert, I heard something about cheese and just picked that. Thinking that it was going to be cheese cake, I soon found out that....What is meant by cheese was actually really cheese. There was goats milk cheese and Lyon cheese. Lyon cheese was hard on the outside, and really soft in the middle. Only ate the middle part.

Comparing to the 3 course meal we had for lunch, we went for kebab the night before for dinner.
Is that kebab? That was my initial reaction as it was my first time seeing frenchfries in kebabs. Maybe that is why they call it frenchfries. They put it in everything.

Our last dinner was in the comfort of our own hotel. We decided to take the recommendation of the hotel's receptionist to order pizza. It was delivered straight to our room on the 4th floor. That is what you call room service at a 4 star hotel.Even the pizza in France was unique. We tried the one with white base instead of the usual tomato base which was not bad. The funniest thing was, they put egg as one of the topping. Tasted unusual, but at least it was edible. Not recommended.Our last photo before we retired to our hotel. Liked the lighting but hard to capture properly on camera. Thanks to Helen's creativity and effort, we got a really nice picture here.


Being able to afford to stay in a 4 star hotel means that we have to travel to the airport with class as well. Took 2 cabs with 3 person in each cab to the airport. Cost of trasport, 14 euro each.

Actually, we didn't want to take the cab. We did ask the hotel reception which was the cheapest way to get to the airport and he told us that the shuttle bus cost 20 euro and it was cheaper to get the cab. When we reached the airport, we found out that the shuttle bus actually cost 6.50 euro. Well, we have to end our trip with class. It didn't end there. For the first time in many flights, each of us checked-in our bags. (Reason: BMI allows free check-in of 1 luggage).Last but not least, I remembered what Laetitia, my French flatmate who comes from Lyon as well, recommended - Le Coussin de Lyon. Came across that in the duty free shop at the departure area at the airport. Not bad tasting, sweet, a hint of mint and chocolate in the middle. Not a big fan of sweet, so, not a big fan of coussins as well.

Till next time.