Christmas in Lyon - Place Carnot and our petite Sapin

While Anna was on a mission to find Hex Bugs in Lyon, she discovered that Place Carnot had been transformed into a little village full of shops(>100 of them). Shops of every description – complete with lights, carols, delicious smells, and a small Christmas tree lot. So as soon as David was well enough, we went there together.

It was fun checking out all the various shops – there was even a Rotary booth with a Santa (Pere Noel) to visit, but he was on lunch break. We bought a small loaf of dark, spiced honey bread with orange in it to enjoy later; it was kind of like fruit cake without all the candied fruit. After looking at all the food booths, we discovered we were getting hungry. So we got a large slice of Alsatian “pizza”; it was really, really similar to one we like to get at Trader Joes. (Or, Trader Joe’s is similar to the real thing.) We also shared a cup of hot red wine with spices – just the right thing to warm us on a very cold day!

Our last stop was the Christmas tree (sapin) lot. Folks here don’t have stands with water for their trees; they just used crossed pieces of wood or small, half logs with a hole drilled for the tree trunk. We chose a small tree that came with the log. The man at the lot, encased the tree and log in a stretchy net to make it easier to carry. Then we left for home. David got the honor of carrying the tree –back through Place Carnot, down Victor Hugo (pedestrian-only street with lots of shops and lots and lots of shoppers), down the stairs to the Metro station, through the turnstile (I put his ticket in for him), on to the A line train, then off the A line and changing on to the B line, then off the train, through to turnstile going out, up the stairs, and a small hike to our apartment. He was very glad we agreed on a small, table-sized tree. Those of you Peanuts fans will understand what we mean when we say it was a “Charlie Brown tree.” But, it looked cute with the decorations Dominique, our land lady, loaned us and fit nicely in our livingroom.



More to come…