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Published: December 9th 2006
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The final stop of our 6-day mini adventure was Lille, in NE France, close to the Belgian border. I remember learning about Lille at primary school - I have this vivid memory of looking for it on a school map of France (weird or what?) and I remember learning that the car industry was big in the area. Amazing what kind of information your brain retains, as what use could Lille be to a 10-year-old in Greece? I certainly hadn't imagined then that 20 years later I'd be visiting in person, and I was rather excited to be going. About time the spot on the map became a real, live city. 😊
We left Aachen around 2 pm for Brussels, from where we were due to catch the 17:01 Eurostar to Lille. We only had 1.5 hours in Brussels this time, so we decided not to risk another visit to the Christmas market, but to spend our time at Brussels Midi instead. It was our fifth day "on the road" and we were getting a bit tired of walking around in the freezing cold, so staying in the relative comfort and warmth of a railway station seemed like a good
idea. After all, there were plenty of shops to keep us busy, and an hour and a half isn't that long really.
We bought Christmas cards (with wishes in French this time!) and more postcards, stocked up on cosmetics and magazines, browsed around the dvd store, and still there was an hour left before the train was due to leave. Not realising that we would now be boarding a train that exited the Schengen area (the final destination was London, even though we were hopping off at Lille) and that there would be the invariable delay of luggage and passport checks before we got to the platform, we decided we had plenty of time to spare so we got some dinner. We had Belgian fries at one of the station cafes (which were *not* of
Fritkot standard, but hey, this was a rail station) followed by waffles with Haagen Dazs ice-cream. This was the second from last day of our trip, and we were very excited that we'd see our fifth city and Christmas market in as many days. We ate our ice-creams and chatted away, making plans for that evening - until about 5:10 pm when we realised
that we should have been on a train 9 minutes earlier!! 😱
We thought it was so funny that we'd missed our train that instead of panicking, we got the giggles. The mere thought that we were having such a good time eating waffles and ice-cream from paper plates in a railway station cafe that we ended up missing our train, still makes me chuckle. 😊
We rushed over to the Eurostar terminal in case our train was delayed, by no such luck. It'd already been and gone. We weren't terribly worried. Lille is only 37 mins by train from Brussels and there are several services a day, so we thought we'd just get new tickets and hop on the next one. It turned out one of our tickets was fully refundable/exchangeable and the other semi-so, so after paying a small amount of money (something like 7 €) we were in possession of a new pair of tickets for the next Eurostar service, which we promptly caught.
Due to the delay in Brussels, we arrived in Lille quite late and didn't spend much time at the Christmas market. We wandered round the city, got caught up in
the filming of a movie or TV show and were shooed away (after 5 days of travelling and living off a tiny suitcase we can't have looked our best, but that was no reason to make it so obvious we were no good for their film!) so our career as film extras was amazingly short lived. Lille is a beatiful city, very Flemish in style, in fact it feels like you're in Belgium rather than France. Which I suppose you almost are, as you're practically on the French-Belgian border (Lille is just 91 km from Brussels and double that and then some from Paris).
Lille is stunning at night, especially pre-Christmas, with all the lights. A photographer's dream. Only a
true photographer would come prepared, whereas we had great fun looking for places to balance our cameras for the night shots. We found the bins that were mounted on street lamps came handy, but we really must bring tripods next time. If nothing else, we'll get less funny looks from passers by...
The next day we met up with two friends, who came over from London on a day trip. It's so strange, being able to hop to
another country and back on the train. Especially since the county you hop from is an island! I often marvel at how much the chunnel has changed, well, maybe not our lives, but our travel options for sure. For a start, I bet they barely saw any Brits in Lille before Eurostar put it on the map so to speak, but I'm glad it did because it's a lovely city and well worth spending a day or two in.
The Christmas market in Lille was more or less as we'd expected; not as good as Cologne, but better than Amsterdam. They sold croustillons and mulled wine, but the French croustillons are sprinkled with caster sugar, and they're not as nice (esp. if, like me, you don't like caster sugar). Thankfully we were compensated by the yummy
brochettes de fruits - skewered pieces of fruit (or marshmallow, although then they're not
de fruits IYSWIM) dipped in chocolate. Simply divine!
Of the ornaments, the most impressive were the miniature figures, which I think they use for their nativity scenes. There were rows and rows of neatly arranged tiny men, women, children and animals, some tinier than others. A miniaturist's heaven!
The Christmas market by day
If you look carefully you can make out the ferris wheel in the background, behind the buildings on the left There was a large ferris wheel near the Christmas market which seemed to attract locals and tourists, but we didn't go up. Jasmin and I aren't big on heights, and the other two weren't fussed either, so we gave it a miss. Maybe next time. It does photograph beautifully though, esp. at night, with the lights on against the dark sky.
What amazed us about Lille is that it was full of English people. We stopped at a brasserie for a quick drink (but mainly for a place to write our postcards hehe) and of the people around us, only a couple of young men were French. Even the waiter insisted on speaking to us in English. We could be in a pub in London really, if it wasn't for the festive ferris wheel right outside. It was weird.
Other than the Christmas market, there was a pedestrianised area worth strolling through and plenty of nice shops - not just patisseries, but shops selling jewellery, cosmetics, clothes and shoes. Lille's not a bad place to be if you like shopping and have a visa card in your purse. Lucky this was our last stop, which meant any shopping we did was going straight home with us, so we didn't have to worry about extra bags. Or perhaps not so lucky, if you look at it from the point of view of the credit card bill that would land on the mat a month later...
All in all, we had a brilliant time on our mini Christmas market tour. Amsterdam was the highlight and Cologne had the best market, but we enjoyed Brussels, Aachen and Lille too. We're definitely doing this again next year. Watch this space! 😊
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Jet Set
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:)
an honest account of your trip... very amusing. I am planning to visit France in summer 2007 and will try to swing by Lille. If you or any one has sugguestions i'd appreciate your advice : i_travel_jet_set@yahoo.com