Lazy Thursday Morning

This morning we ordered breakfast for our room.  It came at exactly the time requested, 7.30.   Two pots of tea, two glasses of juice, and seven croissants and pastries, which were just delicious.   By the time breakfast arrived, we had been  powering down the river to our next port of call which was Lyon for over two hours.  Note the folded serviettes, they looked just like ankle boots...very clever!

  

An early morning river shot from our French balcony .

We had a very leisurely morning, eating in bed, writing the blog and reading.    By the time we were both up and about, it was time for TRO to go to the wheelhouse for a tour, and for us to decide which excursions we would take for the rest of the week.

After a light lunch, we were taken by bus on our city tour of Lyon.   Lyon is the second or third largest city in France, depending on how you count the inhabitants, of which there are one to one and a half million, again, depending on the way they are counted.   In either case, it's an important city for trade, and has been since Roman times.  The city is generally associated with gourmet eating, it is rival,Ed only by Paris when it comes to Michelin stars.    It proudly boasts that it is headquarters of Interpol, and also is a old Roman colony with the  second largest network of aqueducts in the Roman Empire .   The Christian community here is the oldest  in France, and there is currently an archeological dig to discover the old Roman theatre where many were martyred.

Lyon sits on two rivers, the  Saone and  the Rhone, and our  ship is moored on the Rhone.  We were driven around the city to orient ourselves, our first stop was at the 

This basilica was built by the citizens of Lyon, as an expression of thankfulness for being saved from invasion during the Franko Prussion war.   It rivals the Sacre Coeur in Paris and the views from the top of the hill where it sits are rewarding. 

We also had a walking tour of the "old city", with a little free time for shopping if we wanted. The old city consists of small cobbled streets, with lots of doors opening onto the street.

Inside the buildings, typical of the era, they have courtyards with spiral stairs leading up to the next levels.    There are also a system of alleyway types of paths inside them called traboulles, a French word that is peculiar to the area.   These enabled the residents to move from street to street.    Now the city pays the private owners to keep them open from 7 am until 7pm.   

 After another yummy dinner we were entertained by a French singer Danni....Kath thinks it was a bloke, I'm not so sure.  In any case, raucous singing in French was not my cup of tea, so we left for an Early night.   This cruising is tiring work !