PÂTISSERIES

There were only three Pâtisseries in Lyon that I would bother with:

TAFFIN
BERNACHON
&
LE PAIN BOULANGER

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TAFFIN

128 Rue Bugeaud, Lyon 6th

The first pâtisserie is tucked away in the back streets of a Lyonnaise neighbourhood. The cabinets and the delicacies are pared back - only five eclairs are on show, only a few small coconut treats under a glass dome on the counter. Each pastry looks as if it was lovingly prepared with gold tweezers, by the same people that put tiny ships inside glass bottles.

Taffin does not serve up any of that sugary-sweet gel, dense and flavourless shortcrust shit. No, here the flavours are delicate but true - lemon is lemon. 

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BERNACHON

42 Cours Franklin Roosevelt, Lyon 6th

The second pâtisserie is more of a well-rounded bakery: selling everything from quenelles with their accompanying lobster sauce, to large cakes, to bite sized bits of chocolate. And oh my lord, the chocolate! 

Bernachon makes their own chocolate, from scratch - meaning they source the very best beans and bring them all the way to their realisation in a ganache-filled, heaven-sent form. As great as that sounds, the pastries are every bit as wonderful. The cabinets are full of them, stacked in wooden display boxes end to end to end, a salivation enducing dream. A tarte aux framboises, with raw raspberries peeking through the dollop of glaze, sits next to a tall carré pistache, enrobed in chocolate, which itself sits next to an éclair café with pastry so light that it might take up and fly away. 

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LE PAIN BOULANGER

12 Boulevard Émile Zola, Oullins

The Bread Bakery - where the residents of Oullins would trip down to buy their daily baguettes. The pastries at Le Pain Boulanger were nothing to call home about, nothing fancy. Yet I would stop here whenever it was open for a few good reasons.

One. It was close to home.
Two. It was good food - simple, yet good. A loaf of bread here tastes like yeast and the smell of rising dough. A muffin framboise was like a succulent and dense banana bread, minus the banana.
Three, and the most important reason of all. I liked the shop owner and she liked me. Having had the shared experience of living in New Zealand, we would chat about this and that, and then she would slip a free croissant or two into the white paper bag along with my tarte tatin. I loved this place simply because it felt homely.

RAIN BY THE QUAI

Marie Laforêt - Mes Bouquets d'Asphodèles

Marie Laforet

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One of life's small pleasures is to take a walk in the rain.

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Now, imagine you are walking a cobbled way, under bare branches, past grand buildings, all the while a river runs beside you. It is deep and swift, and the rain barely makes a mark on its granite surface.

You pass a group of tourists huddled under colourful umbrellas, learning about a hallowed statue of someone-or-other. An empty skate ramp lies to your left, one that on sunny days would be filled with teenagers and the clickety clack of wheels. Now all is silent with the rain. It drips off of twigs onto your hair and into your jacket if your hood is down. You neglected to wear a rain jacket - wool works just fine. 

You stop by your favourite patisserie, the one that makes those perfect tartes with the custard and the raspberries. Walking out with the paper bag, you know the perfect place to eat: in the awning of a closed cafe in the park, where the chairs are stacked ten high.  It is Sunday. Doves are cooing in the alcoves.

Back on the cobbled path, the rain glistens on red berries and pools in the cusp of the flowers, gathering in puddles under foot. A child on a small tricycle passes you, and splashes through the water with a ssshing sound as the tires pick up the thin veil from the ground. Further on, a bevy of swans parade down river. And there is some kind of impeccable joy radiating from within you, to be outside in the rain. It is the joy of solitude, that smells like winter, and that feels like a warm glow within.

Later you will go indoors and your face will defrost, your hands too, and you will wonder how you ever went outdoors in such weather. But for this moment, you can live with the rain.

MY FAVOURITE PLACE IN LYON

Sitting on a cold stone wall, legs dangling between a metal trellis, and looking out over the river, the city and the great cathedral on the hill. That was my favourite place to be in Lyon. 

The hidden gardens in a nunnery came at a close second, but nothing could beat that view from my spot up in the Croix Rousse. I would go there on sunny days to eat my stash of macarons and write in my diary. And I would go there on sombre, moody-cloud days to simply sit and think about the world.

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GAINING PERSPECTIVE

I am convinced that a great view will give a person some perspective on life. Up in the air, looking down on the world, we can feel detached from the ordinary worries that plague us as we roam the streets. What to buy for dinner, what this or that person said the other day. All those things are now unimportant, they have shrunken into miniscule perspective. Along with this, we can gain a sense of our own importance within this world. Just look out at that view - what can you see? Maybe hundreds or thousands of people, other souls in their search for happiness. We are not alone. Or maybe you can see the world as it truly is: a vast expanse of beauty and wonder, stretched out before you. Hills, lakes, oceans, sunsets. Miraculous, is it not? We are just a part of that larger whole. Or maybe, if you really set your mind to it, you can feel the ebb and flow of the whole universe, on those outer bounds of space. You feel yourself as a tiny speck in a great moving system. This is the moment I search for: that realisation, when all your thoughts become mere drifts of fluff in the phenomenal sea of life. Every little thought is washed away and your brain can float a while in a clear stillness. Like a silence. 

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Yes, that one stone fence was certainly my favourite place in all of Lyon, for there, I could see clearly.