Day 2 - Paris à Lyon - 03 Septembre 2019

Un croissant!

Day 2 - Paris to Lyon - 03 September 2019

#paris #france #sncf #traintravel #lyon #gaeilge #irishcommunity #muintirnahéireann #irishdiaspora

As I had plenty of time, I took a leisurely breakfast, café au lait, orange juice and a croissant. I took time to read my book about the experiences of Jewish woman from Den Haag during the second world war.

Le TGV for Lyon

Finally it was time to leave, I found the correct place to alight, right at the back I accidentally bought a first class ticket! Well, wouldn't you know, the guy next to me ALSO pulled down his blinds blocking my view.

Lyon looking better after some exploring

I arrived with a slight delay in Lyon. I made my way to the hotel by foot, the internet lied again, I could have taken the metro. First impressions, ah bit "blah", lost of office buildings, very modern.

French bread at its best!

Later I walk towards the city centre passing boulangerie where I bought a gorgeous baguette for 95 cents! A little further along the way I found a supermarket where I bought compté cheese and some other cheese from the Pyrenées.

Côte du Rhone wine

I finally reached the old city, with a bridge across the Rhône. For years I had wanted to to visit here, my school was supposed to send me here too. Also I have had countless Côtes du Rhône wines too!

WW2 commemoration

The tradition is always to send postcards to a number of friends every time I reach a new destination. There seemed to be some kind of war commemoration going on with old army vehicles from WWII and American and French flags everywhere as well as the local flag from Lyon. Somebody made a speech which had the attention of a large crowd, but I didn't hang around. I crossed a second bridge and BAM! I saw old cobbled streets and an Irish pub called "James Joyce". There was a large square witha cathedral and some small cafés.

My view while sipping wine

There was also a postbox, so I found a terrace and ordered a local Côtes du Rhône and wrote my postcards striking up my a conversation with a Croat in Croatian. After the wine I went to the Irish pub.

All these connections!

Suddenly there were all these connections. The local Irish club had also pop-up Gaeltachts, and Ciarán a Brtish born Kerryman explained how his father was a native Irish speaker. There was a French woman from Champagne who was married to man from Mayo, also an Irish speaker. The daughter who was there too was attending University there and the son who was also present had actually attended the TU-Delft! Turns out that they actually grew up in California.

My "happy meal"

I had two pints, then continued towards the gay bars, had a water and then took the metro back to the hotel. The cheese I that I had bought earlier had gone soft, but the baguette was as crisp and gorgeous as ever! Bread, cheese and wine! The crusty baguette caused my gum to bleed where my tooth had recently been extracted. I convinced myself that I needed wine, took one sip and poured the rest away!

In a word #connection