We stopped for a break at the Sacred Heart Basilica of Paray-Le-Monial. The Romanesque church was built at the end of the 11th century by Hugues de Semur, abbot of Cluny. In 1875, it was transformed into a Basilica dedicated to the Sacred Heart.
This crazy car was in the parking lot near the basilica.
We stopped in the charming town of Moulins for lunch.
The Alps with the trees in all stages of fall colors was beautiful as we approached Lyon.
We drove by fields of lavender, although the harvest of most of the lavender had already taken place earlier in the fall.
It is hard to imagine our big bus would fit through this small mountain pass...
...but it was no trouble for our handsome, crafty driver, Nikki. Although, we did come face to face with a camper on the other side - but Nikki and the other driver worked it out and we were back on our way.
Janice poses with some lovely flowers during a short lunch break in Sisteron.
The town of Sisteron is built on a narrow rocky gap where the Durance and Buech rivers join. Behind Sandra is a 13th-to-17th century citadel, which was built on the cliff to protect the town.
The scenery was beautiful driving along the Route Napoléon in the foothills of the Alps.
The winding road took many hairpin turns as we drove through the mountains.
The town of Castellane is invisible from a distance as you approach, except for a tall rock jutting straight up out of the valley, with a stone chapel (from 1703) perched on top. The Chapel Nôtre-Dame-du-Rock was built by the monks of the Abbey of St-Victor of Marseilles.
Charmaine, Susan and Connie are enjoying a cup of tea at an outdoor cafe in Castellane.
This cricket planter is a souvenir from southern France.
The first roundabout was constructed in Paris around the Arc de Triomphe in 1901. As of mid-1997, there are about 15,000 modern roundabouts in France. We went around many of these roundabouts during our trip.
Grasse is a very beautiful town in southeastern France and is the center of the French perfume industry. It produces over two-thirds of France's natural aromas (for perfume and for food flavourings). This industry turns over more than 600 million euros a year.
This roundabout in Grasse features a copper vat that was used by a perfume maker to steam blossoms to distill their essence. And it wasn't déjà vu, but we really went around this one several times.
Déjà vu is the experience of feeling sure that one has witnessed or experienced a new situation previously - the term was coined by a French psychic researcher, Émile Boirac in the late 1800s. Whether déjà vu or a wrong turn at a roundabout, we got to spend a little more time in beautiful Grasse.
Lyon is in east-central France and is the third-largest French city, the first being Paris and the second Marseille. Lyon's geography is dominated by the Rhône and Saône rivers. I have no idea which river this is since we had such a whirl-wind tour of Lyon upon arriving.
Lyon, with more than 150 painted walls is the kingdom of trompe l'oeil - paintings creating a world of fantasy and poetry. Trompe-l'œil, is a French term that means "trick the eye" and is an art technique involving extremely realistic imagery in order to create the optical illusion that the depicted objects appear in three-dimensions, instead of actually being a two-dimensional painting.
Lyon also has a reputation as the French capital of gastronomy - which is the study of the relationship between culture and food. So, I guess that is why we had such an interesting dinner in a the basement of a restaurant decorated with creepy puppets.
Click here for the recipe for Chicken Liver Pudding.
I could not find any detailed information about this flower sculpture located in the Place Bellecour, but I did find a cool website for Lyon's annual festival of lights which is coming soon on the 8th of December.
Raimondo and I are sitting in the lounge of our Paris hotel, toasting to a great trip with a couple of cold 1664 Beers.
Think of France and perhaps the thing you are least likely to think of is beer. In fact, it's French premium Kronenbourg and is France's top-selling beer - more than one out of every five beers sold in France is a Kronenbourg. The 1664 comes in a Phillipe Stark designed fluted glass bottle by with a screw top to keep it hygenic and fresh. Starck's goal was to highlight the noble nature of beer.