A Li'l Bit of Lille

We were off to France for a few days. Houston gave a talk at the university in Lille, in the north of France. It really is just a hop, skip and a jump from London. In fact it cost us more to get from Cambridge to London than it did to get from London to Lille, a mere 1 1/2 hour Eurostar train ride. My first time through the Chunnel. We got off at this lovely train station in Lille.




My sherpa, Houston directing the way.


We stayed in the old section of downtown, a beautiful city settled around 640. But on our way, we saw some fun sculptures. In one of the leaves on the right, 2 children are playing.


There is an offbeat, whimsical sense to this city (the 4th largest city in France). I saw these gnomes in many places, all uniformly giving me the finger. They were either doing that or peeing.


There was lots of graffiti in the town, in fact, I think they encourage it.


And the BIGGEST surprise of all were the dozen giant baby statues downtown. They stood maybe 25' tall, solid black with varying types of wings, scales, dinosaur-like appendages on diapered baby figures.










When I rounded the corner and saw all these babies against the backdrop of the very ancient buildings, I stopped dead in my tracks, put my luggage down and just laughed. I gotta hand it to them. I don't think this would happen in DC!


We were put up in this fabulous hotel. It's a combination of 2 old buildings, a new building and joined by a central atrium.


The walkway to our room.


Towards dinnertime, we really did look for a French restaurant, but found only Brazilian, Ethiopian, Italian, and ended up at a Moroccan restaurant. Yummy.


Our hotel was right on a canal waterway. This is the scene across the canal from our hotel.


The following day, I was left to my own devices and just meandered around the bustling city center. It doesn't look bustling yet, but I learned that I happened upon the biggest sales event of the year. It lasts an entire month and nearly everything is on sale. It was so crowded, lines to try on clothes, lines to pay, but it was fun even though I had a language problem. I swear, I am so bad at learning any language. When one of my items didn't come up as on sale, even tho I knew it was, I just sucked it up and paid the full price. Doh! That will teach me to be stupid. But everyone was nice and no one seemed in a hurry.


I don't know how my friend, Piver, snuck over to paint this wall, but it looks just like something she'd do.



I went into one store that had a mix of yarn, ribbon, feathers, beads, craft supplies and buttons, buttons, buttons. All in a tiny space of about 200 sq. ft.


I love buttons, amassing a large stash myself. But nothing compared to this. Old, new, vintage, bakelite, metal, shiny, dull, sparkly, prints, patterns, plain, and every imaginable color. WOW!


And the ribbons were delightful too.



I tend to look up a lot, looking at the architecture of the buildings. Your eyes get overwhelmed with what the shops want you to see with their stuffed windows, colorful wares and big sale signs. But look up and it's arched windows, curved cornices, gables galore and sometimes a painted advertisement.


But looking at the French bread is pretty peaceful.


or into walkways


I saw quite a few flower shops. They differ from ours (except for the smell. They all seem to smell alike, the deep wet, earthy smell with a high note of fragrance) in that they have unusual arrangements.


like this ambrosial display of not-fully-opened roses, sedum and something else I can't identify. I loved the color combo too.


The alternating kinds of thyme and sedum made for a nice patchwork of sorts.


Decorative chilis, sedum and white flowers


and at the end of the day, these were my sore feet, having walked and walked miles over the cobbled walkways and streets of Lille.

Moors to Dales, Lovin' Yorkshire

After Robin Hood's Bay Seal and I scooted through the Yorkshire Moors. There is one main road that circles around the area (about 100 miles around), with the terrain looking rather flat or a bit rolly. But once off that road, you go down very steep (25%) grades to the valleys below.


We had some onlookers while we were maneuvering these tiny backroads, occasionally having to turn around (9-point turn!).


We should really invent a sheep that eats thistle and stinging nettles, two plants that this country has WAY too many of.


A tad breezy up on the moors!


Every village was cuter than the last one. I was really proud of myself for driving on the left. I got used to it pretty fast and with Seal helping ("Stay left! Stay left!") I was soon zipping around corners, parallel parking and even softly cussing at Brit drivers to hurry it up!


In one of these valleys is Rivaulx Abbey. I'd been here 2 years ago and wanted to show Seal. We didn't go in, just walked down the road a bit to look.


The tiny village surrounds the abbey and this Historical Trust site is right in their back yard. Ho hum. They probably find it annoying with all the tourists coming through.


We ate lunch in this farm shop along the way. There are many of these places in England. They grow their own produce, raise their own meat and sell right on the property. There is also a cafe in the loft and tables right by the cattle. It did smell 'barny' which doesn't bother me but I could see that some folks wouldn't want to eat their apple pie by cow pies.


The structure is a very long barn made of stone. I've seen many of these turned into homes.


I thought the displays of produce so enticing. Kale, onions, leeks, cauliflower.


Gooseberries and strawberries...mmmmm




Didn't have a chance to try the Magnet Ales but I sure did like the sign.


We took a twisty turny road, down, down, down to this little railroad depot. I guess it's a town as it was on the map but it consists only of the depot, an artist's studio and a B&B. After looking around a bit, we continued on but ended up in a thick forest and after taking a number of roads, decided it best to turn around and head back the way we had come. Good thing too. We didn't have a very good map but did have "Miss Mapple", our GPS. She kept recalculating but we overrode her and turned around. When we did get to look at a more detailed map, it seems we would have come to a dead end.


Happy train!






Always polite.


A few more sights along the way....


There are so many little stands in front of people's homes. Usually it's plants or flowers. I thought this one was so cute. I may put up one in front of my house in Barnesville. One summer, about 15 years ago, I had an abundance of zinnia flowers. I cut many bouquets and put them in a large bucket out front, with a little 'honesty' box for money. The boys were young then and thought it so much fun to lift up the top of the box and retreive the money.


Just a little castle ruin in a village. La de da. We were walking from the car park to the market and passed it on the way.


This is one of those very steep roads. It's about to drop off and I wanted to see how steep it was before driving over what seemed like a cliff. It was ok, but a wee bit scary when other cars were coming up. Pulling over was a challenge, especially trying not to hit the sheep. This particular sheep was laying in the road when we came by the first time and was still in the same place on our return an hour later.