After a week with little or sketchy internet aceesss, I'm finally back online -- I've heard so much about how Europe is way ahead of the US in terms of internet speed and coverage -- my eperience has been anything but -- at least outside of Paris. Traveling throughj rural France, I have rarely had reliable, much less speedy internet access -- and the last two days in England, I'm having "flashbacks" of 1980's AOL -- absolutely horrible! Can't wait to see what happens when I get into the "wilds" of Scotland and Ireland!
Anyway, let me try and "catch-up" on my journal entries starting with Lyon, France. Lyon is a fairly major city in France, a medieval city surrounded by a modern business district, two rivers dividing the place into thirds and four subway lines (that were laid-out with no rhyme or reason -- for two of the lines it's like they threw darts at a wall, drew curved lines between the darts and proceeded to use those ofr the subway stops -- plus, for some stops, you have separate above ground entries and exits -- think of a clock face imposed on a large square measuring forty yards by forty yards -- the "12" and "6" are the exits, the "3" the "9" are entrances with minimal signage -- took me a while to figure that one out -- not the most customer friendly experience.) Except for the old city and the rivers, I could've been in Denver!
Decided to visit the Basilique de Notre Dame the first day -- promptly took the wrong subway line in the wrong direction (for some reason they also decided that the station names on the official subway maps didn't have to necessarily have to match the station names once you actually got into the system -- turned inot "count the number of station dots on the map" -- "five" -- get off after the train stops five times regardless of what name is on the station wall (if any) -- seemed to work once I figured it out. To reach the Basilique you have two choices, walk a half mile up a very steep hill or take a funnicular (kind of a cable car on a diagonal-sloped track) -- I rode. The Basilique, like most of the churches in France, was amazing -- the architecture, the stained galss, the feeling of "spaciousness" -- quite impressive. Then there was the "city" view touted in the tour books as "do not miss" -- think I "missed" it -- the view felt like you were high-up looking at a bunch of nondescript office buildings down below -- whoppee!
Ruins of a Roman colliseum were just a few blocks away -- again listed as a "do not miss" -- they were somewhat interesting -- except that the city is turning the ruins into a modern day musical amphitheater complete with huge banners, loud speakers, posters and a cheap looking stage -- talk about ruining a national treasure!
Next day, I signed-up at the tourist office for a "Tour of the Traboules -- the Secret Passages of Lyon". The tour didn't start until early afternoon so spent the day wandering around the Medieval part of town which was neat -- touristy, but still interesting -- and visiting the Cathedral of St Jean which again was impressive. Best part was buying a crepe at a little "hole-in-the-wall" place and sitting on the steps of the Cathedral eating it and leisurely watching people walk by.
Oh yeah, the "secret passages" tour -- the one that took a group of us down narrow alleyways -- almost all of which had large entryway signs over them proclaiming "secret passageways/traboules" -- not quite sure sure who these were secret from .... They were/are covered alleys people use to keep from getting wet when it rains, that they use to get to interior entrances to apartment buildings and that they used to use to transport merchandise in inclement weather from factories to the wharfs. Mildly interesting, but mostly just a "bust"!
If you haven't picked-up on it yet, in general, Lyon was not my "favorite " city.
The most interesting thing I did, and it was on a "spur-of-the-moment" to fill time -- was to visit the Lumiere brothers' house/factory. Louis and Auguste Lumiere are considered to be the grandfathers of today's motion picture industry. Thomas Edison came up with the idea of using sprockets to advance the film frames to create the illusion of a "moving" picture in 1894; however, his plan was to make several indivudual devices available to the spectators instead of a single device for a group of people. The Lumiere brothers developed what they called the Cinematograph, capable of projecting the film frames on a screen or wall for simultaneous viewing in 1895. Previousy they had developed a camera capable of taking multiple photos in succession -- early "film". A few years later they developed a process capable of simulating "colored" images on glass plates -- prior to this, images were all black and white. To promote thier business, they trained and sent photographers all over the workd to record strange and exotic places and people -- these "moving pictures" were then shown in concert halls to packed audiences throughout Europe and the United States -- it apparently was like a modern "rock concert" type of event. The museum in their house recounts their history. At one time, their "backyard" held held hundreds of buildings and employed thousands of people developing, editing, duplicating and packaging their "movies" for shipment around the world.
The museum has digitized the original "movies" and it's amazing to watch them -- each ran for 47-49 seconds and covered everything from street scenes, to tumbling acts to practical jokes to animals -- anything they thought would be interesting and people would pay to see.
