We chose a stopover here mostly because it was a handy distance for a stop between Castres and Lyon. What a fortunate choice. We loved this place and had several exceptional food experiences. If you are seeking a not-very-touristy place away from the big cities check out Le Puy.

Okay, Le Puy-en-Velay is very, very nice. It is quite green, with nice gardens and welcoming parks, a river, and the dramatic steep needle-like hills topped with monuments and in one case a church. Why people insist on building in these virtually inaccessible spots…but the results are scenic in the extreme. We had booked an inexpensive hotel on the edge of the old, historic parts of the city which was great because we parked in the hotel lot for two days and walked everywhere. (Ibis Le Puy-en-Velay Centre—welcoming, inexpensive, perfectly situated).

As I wrote earlier, the drive drom Castres was mentally a bit harrowing due to seemingly endless, extremely rural countryside. I’ll add right here that the drive from Le Puy to Lyon was highway the entire way, which was actually a bit too easy. It is also less and less scenic the closer you get to Lyon so the entry to such a well known and loved city was meh, like driving into Chicago.

In April the city was uncrowded. There are always hikers passing through and some are there on a pilgrimage, but this is not such a destination that we were lost in groups of visitors. Everyone was cheerful and warm, and we even saw a side of the town that is, well, a bit bohemian and raucous when the wine is flowing. More on that below.

Wandering the historic areas is a darned delightful way to pass a few hours. You cannot really get lost…it is not that big…and the architecture, the hills, the churches tucked here and there are begging to be photographed. We tried to restrain ourselves, sort of.

We spent several hours in the Musee Crozatier which, like the Toulouse-Lautrec museum in Albi, closed from 12:30-2:00. An hour plus in the morning, a walk to a highly-rated restaurant for lunch, then back for a few hours more. One cool thing we had not experienced before…an animated film about the history of the museum. Who was Crozatier? Why this collection? How has the building changed over time? We realized we didn’t know boo about most of the gazillion museums we have visited in the US and elsewhere. The collection is mostly art with some local history and a natural history floor which had, like the Toulouse museum, two great animations running continuously about the volcanic evolution of the area over millions of years. We have not seen animations like this in US museums and why not? They are fascinating.

A special exhibit at the Crozatier was the history of lace-making for which the city was known for a long time. Cool! Made me sad that lace coasters and curtains are so out of style.

We were lucky to happen upon a mass in progress at the cathedral, where the choir and members were singing—the acoustics of the room made my chest vibrate. It was beautiful.

Food adventures

We had done no research on Le Puy before arriving so I did followed my usual fast search for restaurants on google maps. In general the reviews there are reliable, though occasionally there is an obvious fake, like one in Lyon where a newish restaurant out in the Cite Internationale (giant but attractive offices, the Crown Plaza where we were staying, Interpol headquarters—well out of the city proper though fortunately very quickly accessible by bus) the review started “As I was wandering the streets of Lyon…”. No way. Anyway, back to using google maps to ID good places to eat—this worked very well in Le Puy and we had two memorable experiences.

Being in this city almost by accident, in early spring, we had no idea what the food scene could be, but we were a few blocks from the historic, and fairly lively, narrow streets, one of which turned out to be our destination for coffee and croissants each morning and our memorable dinners. And the best lunch I could have imagined—at a place that had the weird name Le Grand Bowl d’air which seems a play on the phrase “grand air” for fresh air, and indeed the tastes and ingredients were as fresh as could be.

In our experience it is always preferable to show up at lunch time when you are concerned you won’t get a table for dinner. And this particular place did not have online reservations. I am fairly confident of my French in person, but phone calls are a different story. When the Crozatier museum closed for lunch we decided to make the 15 minute walk back to “our street” and take a chance we could get a table. Success was ours, and what a super place. Small of course, perhaps 9 tables, with a very small patio that was closed on this cool day. The server/manager moved balletically among the tables, all full, keeping everyone happy. When at the end of the meal I told him it was an “experience tres genial” he pointed to the woman in the tiny open kitchen, the only other person working, and asked me to tell her what I just said. “It’s all her.” She smiled, I repeated, and I felt so great!

We skipped the wine at lunch because, frankly, we had really overdone it the night before. We had shown up without a reservation about fifteen minutes before 7, opening time, and the door was open and the lights were on so I walked in to ask if we could possibly eat right at 7 without a reservation. This place, named Entrez les Artistes!!!, was well reviewed, very small, a red room hung with lines of white underclothes, linens, and such as if we were under the clotheslines in a tiny house. The cook/owner came out of the kitchen in the back, said sure we could eat and when I said we would be back at 7 she nodded and shrugged, suit yourself. We left and returned at 7 to the empty room, overflowing within a half hour.

The food was homey and delicious and the place was so full we were now crowded against the other patrons. We had drunk two “pots” of red wine and conversation was loud and a little crazy. We were now sharing a table with an American couple, a retired finance guy, the type who plays at being condescending and a little rude to his wife, a special ed teacher on sabbatical. The room got a bit louder, and now I had turned to talk to the artsy looking fellow behind me whom I had heard speaking Spanish—but he was very, very French and wanted to talk about Trump which I was happy to do in French. The cook/owner (who had literally snorted a super-French Trump when we said we were from California) came out of the kitchen every few minutes, pulled up a chair and talked with her customers, went out the front door to have a smoke with other friends passing by, came through to see who needed what, then back into the kitchen. When we left the not-Spanish guy was outside and he showed us the doorway to his apartment—just a block or so away on a side street—so we could see the year it was built, 1643. “My American friend was delighted that my building is older than her country!”

This was a restaurant experience I cannot imagine having in the US. Great all the way around. So great David insisted we go back for our last meal before leaving Friday, May 1, to drive to Lyon. We walked in at 7, sat down, and this night something or other was going on—friends kept wandering in, crowding the sort of bar in front of the kitchen, popping champagne and getting louder and more raucous by the minute. When David asked me what the plat du jour was, I asked the cook, who led me into the kitchen to see it simmering on the stove. What a place. We had another great meal (I maintained my record of having boeuf tartare in every city if possible), wandered out, and never did figure out just what was going on!

May 1, Introduction to Lyon

We had checked the night before, and “our” boulangerie would be open on May 1 so, after confirming that gas stations would be open that day as well (self-service only), went to have coffee and a croissant. As we sat having our petit dejeuner, the queue grew until it was out the door, all hikers, most with backpacks, who were passing through on cross country hikes or the pilgrimage, probably for the 3 day weekend.

They take Labor Day very seriously in France. If you want your restaurant or store to be open you must pay employees double time. Hence things like hotels are open, and some restaurants, small ones with we assume family member workers. We decided to walk around town, explore more of the historic streets and up near the cathedral and other high spots, dawdling until noon since the drive to Lyon would be only about two hours. As we drifted back to the hotel we saw five or six restaurants opening, so we figured we would find a place to stop and eat en route to Lyon.

Well, nope, that was not to be. We just kept going. The drive was pretty boring, the outskirts of Lyon uninspiring. We had decided on the Crown Plaza, even though it appeared to be out of the way, because 1) it was free with our points and 2) it backed up on a big park.

Multiple buses stop right across the patio, so getting around the city was simple. The hotel itself is corporate. The staff is very friendly. Our room was huge. If we were to stay there again, unlikely, we would insist on a high floor on the street side. On the patio side the noise and lights made it mandatory we keep the window closed…and France is strict about not allowing air conditioning until late spring. If only we had asked for a fan! (We recently discovered hotels have fans! And they bring them right to your room! We even got one at the Holiday Inn Express at the airport. Travel tip of the year!!! If you want to sleep cool, Ask For A Fan!!)

So we arrived at the hotel around 2 to drop off our luggage. The young guy at the desk was brusque and pessimistic we could return our car given the holiday, but we were confident and set out for the downtown Sixt location. Closed. I was in a lane with (fortunately very light) traffic, and David had gotten out to see what the deal was. Cars came up behind me, I had to drive away, and realized I was in a part of the city where almost all the streets are one way…and in two minutes I am many blocks away. I work my way back…David is calling Sixt for help, I am now desperate to return this car and be done with urban parking lots and am fearful I will have to drive back to the hotel. And we have not eaten since a coffee and croissant five hours earlier.

David got a rapid fire AI-generated auto attendant at Sixt, talking so fast it was unintelligible. Argh! MY turn to give it a try and managed to get past the auto attendant (yes, it was the fastest and most detailed directions for returning the car) but when I said I need those in writing miraculously I was connected to a live, helpful person. He agrees to send me instructions in an email to David’s address and tells me to program the address of the drop off parking lot into my phone. He PROMISES I will get the email. And, I do. And, we both see that these same very detailed instructions were sent to David the day before. Of course we aren’t on top of our email while traveling, so David didn’t see it. All this insanity could have been avoided…but now we cannot find the entrance to the underground parking lot. David got out, wandered around this block-sized plaza while I flagged down a passerby (“I just moved here yesterday, I didn’t even know there was a parking lot here”) and at last we find it, drop the keys, video the car, and I check Claude re metro and buses. “Bad news, they do not run on May 1.”

Hungry but finally car-free we do the only thing we can and walk back to the hotel. It wasn’t bad! The day was gorgeous, the park adjacent to the hotel was full of families, and though we were super hungry we were confident we could eat at the hotel, which we did. Well, that is after checking in to find out the poor desk guy had been dealing with no working customer elevators since 9 that morning. Friday, May 1…when there are no workers making service calls. Seven floors. Only working elevator was the freight elevator…the sweet and exhausted desk guy walks us through the kitchen, around corners…and we are settled in the room. We go down, have an edible meal, and go to bed. Next day everything was working and we began to explore Lyon.