Lyon

Lyon is a city in the Rhone-Alpes region of France. It's the second-largest city in that country.

Understand

Lyon is a city rich in history, from Roman times to the Resistance. It is also renowned for its .

Get in

By plane

The Saint-Exupéry (or Satolas) airport, 25 km west of Lyon, is linked to the main cities of France and the world. There's a bus service from the airport which takes you to central Lyon in 30-50 minutes.

• http://www.lyon.aeroport.fr/

By train

Lyon is provided with three train stations:

• Perrache
• Part-Dieu - This station is in the commercial centre but has good transport links to the rest of the city by tram bus and metro.
• Saint-Exupéry (the station is outside the city and serves the airport)

Lyon is linked by TGV (fast trains) to Paris (2 hours) and Marseille (2 hours).

By car

Lyon is at the middle of an important network of motorways:

• A6 to the north: Paris...
• A7 to the south: Marseille, Nice, Spain, Italy...
• A43 to the east: Grenoble, the Alps, Northern Italy...
• A47 to the west: Saint-Étienne, Clermont-Ferrand, Massif Central, west of France...
• A42 : to the north-east: Bourg-en-Bresse, Geneva, Switzerland, Germany...

Get around

By bus, tram or subway

Lyon's public transport, TCL, consists of an extensive network of buses, subway (4 lines, 38 stations) and tramway (2 lines, 49 stations).

Lyon has also 2 lines of funicular. These are accessible from the Lyon Cathedral Metro station and provide access to the Roman theatres and Basicila respectively.

• Public transport maps : http://www.tcl.fr/site/00_plans_reseau/index.asp#metro

Since May 2005, Lyon also has a public bicycle service which allows travellers, after registering a credit card, to pick up and drop cycles to and from points around the city.

By car

Traffic is dense. Avoid driving within the city if you can.

See

Lyon has many monuments and museums.

• Theatres Romains de Fourviere, a Roman amphitheater.
• Tête d'Or Park, including zoo and botanical garden.
• Basilique de Fourvière (church)
• Tour de Fourvière
• Palais Saint-Pierre
• Place Bellecour
• Place des Terreaux
• Musée de la Résistance (museum of the Resistance during the Second Wold War): 14 avenue Berthelot, 69007 Lyon. Tel: 04 72 73 33 54, Fax: 04 72 73 32 98. Open from 9 a.m to 5:30 p.m. Closed on Mondays, Tuesdays and holidays. Fees: 3 €. Free for children under 18.
• Musées des Arts Décoratifs and Musée des Tissus: 34 rue de la Charité 69002, Lyon. Tel: 04 78 38 42 00, Fax: 04 72 40 25 12, musees@lyon.cci.fr, http://www.lyon.cci.fr/musee-des-arts-decos/. Open from 10 a.m. to 12 a.m. and 2 p.m. to à 5:30 p.m. Closed on Mondays and holidays. Fees (can also be used for the Musée des Tissus): Adults: 4.58 €. Groups (10 adults minimum) : 3.81 €. Students : 2.29 €. Free for children under 18.
• Musée historique de Lyon et Musée de la Marionnette
• Musée de l'Imprimerie: 13 rue de la Poulaillerie, 69002 Lyon. Tel: 04 78 37 65 98, Fax: 04 78 38 25 95. museeimp@lyon.asi.fr. Open from Wednesday to Sunday from 9:30 a.m. to 12 a.m. and 2 p.m. to 6 p.m. Closed on holidays. Fees: 4 €, students in groups: 2 €.
• Institut Lumière: 25 rue du Premier Film, 69008 Lyon. Tel: 04 78 78 18 95. Open from 2 p.m. to 6 p.m. Closed on Mondays and holidays. Fees: 2.50 €.
• Musée d'Histoire naturelle: 28 Boulevard des Belges, 69006 Lyon. Tel: 04 72 69 05 00, Fax: 04 78 94 62 25. Open from Wednesday to Sunday, from 1 p.m. to 6 p.m. Fees: 3 €. http://www.museum-lyon.org/
• Musée d'Art contemporain
• Musée des Beaux Arts
• Musée de la Civilisation gallo-romaine
• musée de la resistance: very often exhibitions (mostly photography)
• visit (and get lost!) in the traboules. These passages under the building linking backyards with the streets are found mainly on the croix rousse hill. They were first made for the use of the "canuts" (textile worker of the late XVIII to mid XIX century) so that the pieces of fabric could be moved from workshop to workshop without being spoiled by rain. They also were used as hiding places during the German occupation by the resistance members. Today traboules are disappearing because of the security measures against burglary ("digicodes"). The most beautiful ones have been preserved.
• Visit the Old town. (medieval and renaissance buildings)

See around

• the car museum of Rochetaillée: very nice collection of modern and old cars. The main attraction of the museum is the armoured car of Adolf Hitler. Château Rochetaillée, 69270 Rochetaillée-sur-Saône, Tel: 04 78 22 18 80, Fax: 04 78 22 69 60. Open from 9 a.m. to 7 p.m. everyday in July and August, from 9 a.m. to 6 p.m. rest of the year. Closed on Christmas and New Year. Fees: Adults 5 €, free for children under 18. http://tourisme.voila.fr/villes/lyon/fra/sit/rochetai/mautohma/acc.htm
• the village of Pérouges: medieval village north-est of Lyon
• the bird park of Villars-les-Dombes

• Vienne and its international jazz festival.

Do

In the town of Lyon you can go to see many museums and the second largest one in France is right there. It is called The Musee de la Civilisation Gallo-Romaine. It has all kinds of things relating to Rhone-alps history and a lot of other cool artifacts.

Learn

Lyon is an important university center.

Eat

In the traditional "bouchons lyonnais":usually good food, good wine too, and not too expensive. The region around Lyon is generally considered to have some of the best food in all France. For vegetarians, though, the choice might be limited.

Budget

Mid-range

Splurge

• Le Nord* Exquisite meals from 50$ onwards, one of Paul Bocuse's 4 brasseries in Lyon, located in the 9eme arrondisement. near the shores of the saone river.

• Auberge du Pont de Collonges : Paul Bocuse's restaurant, one of the most famous restaurant of France. 40 Quai de la Plage. Tel 04 72 42 90 90, Fax 04 72 27 85 87. From 100 € onward. http://www.bocuse.fr/restaurant/default.htm

For Vegetarians

There are no vegetarian restaurant in Lyon. There was a restaurant called Le Patisson but it closed in 2004.

But there are vegetarian events:

• friendly picnics organised by vegetarians.

Tél. 04 78 85 34 06 (Marie-Gilles)

• "Alliance Végétarienne" organises picnics at the "Parc de la Tête d'Or". Everyone has to bring something to share with the others.

Contact: Susanna (Nosuy@aol.com)

Drink

Lyon offers some nice nightlife. A good starting point is Place des Terreaux and then upwards towards the Croix Rousse. In the streets that climb the hill there are many nice places.

• Becs de Jazz nice jazz club open the week-end from 1 a.m. with live jazz and great atmosphere.
• Phoebus, 22 rue Pouteau, pub with nice live music (African, reggae).
• L'Abreuvoir, rue de st catherine, just above Terreaux there you can join some crazy French listening to crazy French music. Definitively an experience, though not everyone's cup of tea.

At the quai Albert Augagneur is another centre of Lyon nightlife. Along the Rhone river are several out of duty riverboats (peniches) that serve as nightclubs or bars.

• Sirius, 21 quai Augagneur, live events almost every day of the week. The week-ends party on two levels. Nice.
• Fish, 21 Quai Augagneur, another boat, here the house and techno crowd will feel at home.
• Marquise(http://www.marquise.net), Quai Augagneur, here you get nice alternative hip-hop, retro soul and other nice stuff. Sometimes theatre performances.
• River Side, 5 rue St Paul, this is one of the rare places where they play rock music in Lyon. Admission after midnight. Only open on week-ends and before holidays.

Sleep

Budget

• Hotel Vaubecour - 28 rue Vaubecour, in the 2nd arrondissement. Under €30. A very simple, but clean and friendly hotel. Near Perrache train station and close to just about everything. Looked the same as always as of June 2004. Phone: 04 78 37 44 91. http://www.cybevasion.com/hotels/france/hotel_vaubecour_lyon_4163.html

Mid-range

Splurge

Get out

• The Swiss border and the city of Geneva are just over two hours away by train.
• Annecy, the Venice de Savoie is about 2 hours away a and makes a nice daytrip.
• Perouges is a small village at 30 minutes of Lyon. It's buildings all date to the middle ages and it's a popular week-end destination for people who live in Lyon.

This text of this article is licensed under Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 1.0. It has been slightly modified to fit the general design of this website. The authors of this document are Aaron Burda, Anonymous user(s) of Wikitravel, Christian Georg, Evan Prodromou, Sarah Smiles, Wikitravel user Claratatouille, Wikitravel user Jks, Yann Forget and the following WikiTravel users: Akubra, Cjensen, Huttite, Maj, Nils, Nzpcmad, PierreAbbat, Jonboy. The original version of this article can be seen at http://wikitravel.org/en/Lyon.