[Summer in Grenoble] Lyon - Day 1: Buchon for Lunch at Vieux Lyon

June 27th, 2015

After visiting Place Bellecour, I was starting to get hungry

So I came to the Soane river side of the confluence (the area surrounded by Soane and Rhone rivers).

Across the Soane river was the area called Vieux Lyong, which is like the "Old Lyon" or "Lyon Old Town."

According to what I've learned, it was where a lot of the tourist attractions and Buchon restaurants were located at.

An example of a tourist attraction is that Notre Dame de Fourviere Basillica, which I'll be posting about in incoming post.

Anyway, I crossed the bridge and went to Vieux Lyon

Just like it's nicknames suggested,  Vieux Lyon was full of old buildings and old streets.
It almost felt as if I traveled a few centuries back in time.

Theatre de Guignol
It's one of the tourist attractions in Lyon.
I did not go there.

I've heard that eating at a "Buchon" restaurant in Lyon is worth a try, so I was looking for one.

Then I arrived at this plaza.

....and I also found a Buchon Brasserie!
It was finally time to eat some lunch! 

The place was called "La Gargouille"

It looked like this.
It also had outdoor tables, but I decided to eat inside for once because it was so hot outside.

OOh
This restaurant seems to be a gathering place for the fans of Olympique Lyon of Ligue 1.
I wonder how fun it might be if I were here during a Lyon soccer (or football, as they call it in Europe) game.

As I ordered, I first recieved some bread and water.

and a while later, I got what I ordered.
It was pork sausage in Lyonnais style (It was labeled as "Saucisson Chaud Pomme de Terre Huile" on the menu.)

and....
WOW
This was the best thing I've eaten at France.
(Aioli at Marseille was good too, but this was relatively better in my standards)
Maybe this is why Lyon is known to be the kitchen of France.

I came back out into the heat after eating.

and there was a concert rehearsal going on at the moment.
If that concert is tonight, I'd better come out.

Anyway, I made up my mind to come to Vieux Lyon again at night, and started looking around the area and for tourist attractions too.

[Summer in Grenoble] Geneva - Day 3: Dinner, Shopping, and Returning to Grenoble

June 21st, 2015

All we had left was getting something for dinner, taking the train back to Grenoble, and then going to classes for another week.

so my friends and I were looking for places to have dinner.
This was the first place we found, which was by the lake
Unfortunately, this place wasn't serving dinner yet, and was also way too expensive for us.

Then we found this Italian restaurant, called Molino

Took some pictures of the interior of the restaurant on my way back from using the restroom.

but it's so much nicer to eat outdoors!

Instead of "Bon Appetit" they had the Italian version, "Buon Appetito" written on their menu.

I've ordered my favorite Italian pizza, Margherita pizza
This is pretty much the only pizza I order when I go to an Italian pizza restaurant.

However, as soon as we god our food,
we had some uninvited guests.

They were Eurasian Tree Sparrows!
These weren't ordinary Eurasian Tree Sparrows, they were Europe's Eurasian Tree Sparrows!
and European birds aren't afraid of anything.
Whenever we were trying to eat in peace, these birds dived down and flew across our table in an attempt to snatch up some food.

They were so fierce that we had to take a bite and then fight off all those sparrows while chewing.
Haha lol

After the bloody(?) battle dinner, we made our way to the train station.

In Switzerland, Mercedes Benz makes the buses.
Just a random picture passing by.

We all made it to the train station, and we had some time.

then we found this place!

Where they sold Chocolate!
Awww YEAH!

I could not resist the temptation of a Geneva's chocolate brand with long history since 1826, and had to buy one.
(The writer just wanted more Swiss chocolates)

After buying some chocolate,

My friends and I made it to the platform

where our train bound to Grenoble arrived shortly.

All of us were pretty exhausted and weren't doing much talking

So I decided to try some Favarger chocolate.
Well, it had some chocolate hazelnut cream (like Nutella) on the inside, so it was really good!


After an hour or two on the train, we got off at Grenoble train station, transferred onto a tram and was making our way back to our dorm.

Along the way, I saw this and remembered the fact that it was still Fete de la Musique.
Since Fete de la Musique was France's nation-wide music festival, Grenoble was no exception in enjoying an exciting weekend full of cool music!

But we were all tired after the long weekend, so we just went back to the dorm.
It was time for another week of academics.