Sunday 6 may 2012
7
06
/05
/May
/2012
06:39
Today
I am leaving for Bordeaux and the southwest of France for a week before beginning my pilgrimage to Santiago de Compostela in Spain. I plan on walking the 800 km route for about 40 days and
so I won't be posting anything here unless I have access to the internet somewhere along the way. For anyone interested, here is a map of the popular routes. I leave from
St-Jean-Pied-de-Port on the 11th. Take care and God bless.
By The Baguette
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1
Friday 20 april 2012
5
20
/04
/Apr
/2012
17:53
Looking
out from my hotel window I could see one of Lyon’s most famous landmarks, the LCL-Tour Part Dieu, affectinaltly known as “Le Crayon” (the pencil), by most locals and tourists. It was the first skyscraper to be built in Lyon in 1977. It currently stands as the ninth-tallest building in
France. Before checking out of the hotel, I decided to leave my bags with reception and stroll around perhaps one of the most beautiful green spaces
I’ve ever seen, the Parc de la Tête d'Or. This magnificent park is Lyon’s main “breathing space” at 290
acres. The name of the English-style gardens derives from local folklore, which claims that a golden head of Christ is buried
here. Huge wrought-iron gates known as the Porte des Enfants du Rhône mark the entrance. The park was originally planned for
during the 18th century but was not built until 1856. The prefect Claude-Marius Vaïsse entrusted the task to Joseph-Gustave
Bonnet, the city’s chief engineer. He was responsible for creating a nature area, intended to be healthier than the lowly “guinguettes” along the waterfront and to give the bourgeoisie a place to parade their carriages and finery, in imitation of the Bois de Boulogne
outside of Paris. The Swiss landscape designers Eugene and Denis Bulher spent five years trying
to tame the swampy terrain and built a dam creating a huge lake with an island in the middle known as Swan Island. Although
not finished, the park opened in 1857 to the public, but the great greenhouse, the chalet restaurant, the dairy farm and the zoo were not completed until 1862. Today,
the Parc de la Tête d'Or has four rose gardens and a botanical garden with 15,000 listed plants. The zoo has about 1000 animals, including 300 farm
animals, 700 wild animals (250 mammals, 300 birds, 80 reptiles, 70 fish) the most popular being the Atlas lion. Personally, I liked the flamingo pond, the monkey cages and the turtle sanctuary. There are several monuments placed throughout the
park including the Espace droits de l'homme in the northern part of the park. Monoliths erected around the site contain the text of the famous
statement. Another, more recent monument is the sculpture Ensemble pour la Paix et la Justice, made up of bronze and stone. It was
created in 1996 by Xavier de la Fraissinette to commemorate the meeting of the G7. The most elegant part of the park in my opinion was the botanical
gardens with its greenhouses. They enclose a total of 6,500 m² in area, and include a central pavilion for tropical plants including camellias over a hundred years old; a greenhouse-aquarium with
Amazonian water lilies; a Dutch greenhouse containing carnivorous plants; small greenhouses with orchids; and small cold greenhouses with azaleas and cacti. A statue
of Bernard de Jussieu, the botanist who in 1759 arranged and classified the plants in the royal garden of the Trianon at the Palace of Versailles guards the entrance to the large
greenhouses. With time to spare I decided to visit another of Lyon’s wonderful churches.
Located
in the in the Presqu'île district, the Basilica of Saint-Martin d'Ainay started out as a Benedictine priory in 859. The abbey church was built at the
end of the 11th century, consecrated in 1107 and dedicated to Saint Martin of Tours by Pope Pascal II. It is one
of the rare Romanesque churches still extant in Lyon. The basilica at Ainay contains several architectural styles: the chapel of Saint Blandina is pre-Romanesque; the principal structure is
Romanesque; the chapel of Saint Michael is Gothic; and the overall restoration and enlargement of the 19th century is Romanesque Revival.
By The Baguette
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1
Friday 20 april 2012
5
20
/04
/Apr
/2012
16:23
Purchasing a City Pass allowed us to have unlimited access to all forms of city transportation, granted us entry into nearly all of the museums, join any guided tour sponsored
by the tourist office and even allowed us to take a boat cruise along the Saône. Our guide told us all about the old buildings that we could see from
the ship, including the new home of the École Nationale des Beaux-Arts along the quay St-Vincent within the walls of an 18th century convent.
Confiscated during the French Revolution, it became a granary and eventually a factory for the French military where food rations were packaged. Further along the river is the Grenier d'abondance built between 1722 and 1728 as a storage area for corn and other grains.
Eventually it became a military barracks and arsenal for the Gendarmerie nationale until 1987. The Fort
of Saint-John is located right beside the Grenier d’abondance and was originally built as a stronghold against the walls of the Croix-Rousse district in the early 16th century to protect the
inhabitants from the Swiss. It was finally completed in the early 18th century but converted into a regional pharmacy for the Army Health Service in
1932. In 1984 the Army Veterinary Service occupied it. Since its renovation in 2001, it has been the
home to the École nationale des Contrôleurs du Trésor Public. The boat turned around once it reached l'île Barbe, an island in the
middle of the river. An abbey was founded on this island in the 5th century and was the first monastic establishment in Lyon and one of the oldest in
Gaul. Charlemagne endowed it with a fine library. Sadly, it was plundered several times in 676, 725 and
945. In the 9th century it adopted the rule of Saint-Benedict and gradually gained power before being devastated and burnt down in 1562 by Protestant
troops. Today, only the ruins of the Romanesque church of Notre-Dame remain. Private residences
populate the rest of the island. It has a public park accessible by crossing one of the oldest
suspension bridges in Lyon built in 1827. After our wonderful boat ride, we went to the Musée des Automates. The museum is devoted to the art of automatons with seven rooms and over 20 animated scenes for visitors to enjoy.
One of the first scenes pays homage to Laurent Mourguet, the creator of Lyon’s famous puppet, Guignol. His friend Gnafron, his wife
Madelon and the policeman are common characters in a Guignol puppet show. The next room has several scenes that pay tribute to the painter Jean-Francois
Millet who knew so perfectly how to express the hard work of French farmers. The background paintings are copies of Millet masterpieces with working
automatons placed in front. The next room is dedicated entirely to Victor Hugo’s famous novel
The Hunchback of Notre-Dame. Quasimodo is the only automaton in the whole museum with moving eyes. After that comes the depiction of a small village in Provence described so well by Alphonse Daudet in his writing Lettres de mon
Moulin. Room number five is a tribute to Joseph-Marie Jacquard, mechanic and
inventor in 1800 of the first automated device for the silk weaving loom. The scenes depict life in the Croix-Rousse district with its silk
workers busy at their trade. Other rooms depict scenes from Peter Pan, Pinocchio, Zorro, 20,000 Leagues Under the
Sea, The Magic Flute and finally a scene paying homage to Renaissance writer François Rabelais with a scene from his most famous work, Gargantua and
Pantagruel, about a giant who must be fed by a huge staff of kitchen workers who hustle and bustle about making all sorts of dishes.
By The Baguette
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0
Friday 20 april 2012
5
20
/04
/Apr
/2012
16:19
This
enormous mural was painted on a wall inside the restaurant of our hotel and depicts many of the famous buildings of Lyon. I thought it was amazing
and captured the vibrant, colorful life of new and old Lyon.
By The Baguette
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0
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