Without a doubt, this gorgeous basilica is the focal point of Lyon. It stands, majestically, on a prominent hill overlooking the main city below. Its architecture is stunning. The view over the city also stops you in your tracks. The interior of the church is highly decorated with mosaics and glittering in gold.
Our second full day in Lyon was spent in the company of a lovely tour guide, Clémence P. (pictured down below), who met us at the Basilica, taking us on a walking tour inside and explaining the history. She’s a local, although she attended school in the U.S. at some time in her earlier youth and speaks English very well. Joan found her on her internet searches, and she walked us all over the top, then down nearly to the bottom of the hill.
There’s a very cute funicular that traverses up and down the hill every few minutes. So we 4 gals went up on the funicular and walked down, mostly with our guide as she pointed out historical things, bought us a piece of special pastry, and finally left us near a restaurant where we promptly sat down and had lunch.
That mosaic on the right is gigantic and standing as I was down below it my photo doesn’t do it justice.
The church was built in the 1600s and especially dedicated to the Virgin Mary because, it was believed, she sheltered the people of Lyon from the bubonic plague. And every year the city thanks her by a Festival of Lights in early December. The townspeople also credit the Virgin Mary with saving them from a cholera epidemic in the 1800s and from a Prussian invasion in 1870. There are 2 churches, actually, one underneath and then the much more formal and ornate one built on top in the 1800s.
If you’re interested, go to this link on youtube and you can watch a 2 1/2 minute video of the Festival of Lights, which is quite spectacular. It occurs for just 4 nights.
We really only had two full days to tour in Lyon – we stayed 3 nights, but we didn’t get there until early afternoon on day one, had the two full days after, and the following morning we left for Paris. Sunday we did the farmer’s market and some shopping. 
Monday was our tour of the city.
Historically, Lyon was known for the weaving of silk. Somehow in my education of all things history, I never heard that there was any place other than Asia where silk fabrics were made. Actually much was produced in Italy also, in the Middle Ages.
All of us were sad that we didn’t have time to explore that part of Lyon – it’s along one side the river. Picture at left credited to viator.com. Although you might not realize it, looking at that bank of tall buildings, so they said, weavers lived and worked in the same rooms, working only by day (as there was no electricity) with only the windows in the workrooms. In my internet exploring to find that picture, I saw photos of the historic silk weaving
facilities. Cramped for sure. The heyday of Lyon silk weaving was in the 1600s, with about a third of Lyon’s population (15,000) employed in some way in the silk trade. At right, our guide Clémence. She’s standing in front of that beautiful mosaic in the basilica, one of the pictures at top.
Another landmark in Lyon is an ancient Roman amphitheater. In our walk down the hill with our sweet guide (who has a degree in art history) we visited it as well. In my other travels with my DH, we’d visited many Roman amphitheaters in Turkey particularly.
We walked all along the top and around to the other side, then went down to the dais (is that the right use of that word? not sure). Since a couple of my friends had either not seen one of these, nor had they done the most unique thing — walking out to the very center of the “stage” to find the “sweet spot,” usually marked by a stone or something. I did it first – it’s as if you have speakers reverberating back to you – the acoustics are amazing. Other tourists standing up at the very top turned suddenly when I spoke because they could hear me like I was standing next to them. Amazing that the Romans had figured out how to do that! Why don’t we make use of those natural acoustics today?
Along our walk our guide stopped at a bakery. Many of the pastries and desserts made in Lyon are topped with pink praline, usually chopped up of course since they were like candy. Sorry for the reflection in the pastry shop glass. This store is the most famous in Lyon we were told.
Clémence bought us a couple of them – I can’t say that I thought they were anything 
that special – a doughnut kind of thing with lots of pink praline stuck to the top. There was a long line at the shop, though.
After our guide left us, we were hungry for lunch, so we stopped at a restaurant just 20 yards away and enjoyed a nice lunch sitting outside. I ordered Eggs Muerette, a French dish you never see on menus here (I first had it as an appetizer course on a small barge trip in France in 1995 – does that tell you how memorable it was, that I remember it that well?). I’ve never made it. It’s
poached eggs on a little piece of toasted bread and in a pool of red wine sauce. In French it’s Oeufs Meurette. Darlene wanted to try the french fries cooked in duck fat.
They brought her a very large bowl of them, so of course, we all had to have some. They were good, though I actually couldn’t taste the duck fat.
After lunch, it was an easy walk down the rest of the hill, across the river, and back to our cool, quiet apartment.
If you’ve never been to Lyon, and you’re going to France, you need to put it on your itinerary. It was very special. I’d like to go back there someday. Maybe I will.
As we finished up our meal, the waiter suggested we try the little tiny chocolate tart and have a cup of espresso that came with it.
Oh my. It was divine. The French DO know how to do chocolate and the coffee was perfect. A lovely ending to our tour and our day.
We walked all over the old town and I felt like we had a good overall feeling of the city, though we missed out on seeing some of the landmarks.
I love to take pictures of rock walls. Why? I don’t know. I find them unique – see the patches they’ve done in this one (it was near the amphitheater) with stones and bricks. And then to see the foliage that can’t have much water, yet they seem to thrive, but then they’re likely weeds and don’t need much water!
If you’re interested in finding a tour of Lyon, look for the Tours by Locals half day tour that’s customizable. That’s the one we did.
Toffeeapple
said on June 22nd, 2015:
Dais means a platform, stage or podium so your use of the word is correct. The amphitheatre looks enormous.
For information on silk weavers, check out The Huguenots. They moved from France to England and America in the 17th century because of religious persecution, it is a very interesting story.
I could not have done all that walking, well done you!
I have been to France so very many times, but have never yet made it to Lyon.
Yes, I read about the Huguenots when I was researching the post. Yes, I did fine with all the walking. I’m glad my foot is finally back to normal! . . . carolyn t