Day 39 LYON 12.09.2022

So, today is the departure of our new 'lemon', because the 'Hotel Paris' truly deserves that title. After the first evening, when we could still work with the internet, a lot happened: the water in the sink drained slower and a written notice for room service seemed to be ignored; I already mentioned the internet problems yesterday; the €10 breakfast was also nothing special! And if you have to look at the toothpaste residue in the sink because nothing is draining anymore, then we're glad when the door closes.

Off to the train station parking lot, Wilde Hilde is waiting. I left her there completely relaxed because I'm so smart! On the day of arrival, I wanted to find somewhere to park the car in an affordable parking garage or find something else with the help of the tourist information. When I arrived at the parking lot, I noticed a very, very long line at the exit barriers. One was blocked by a German VW camper van and an older French woman with her C 4 was at the other one. Nothing was moving, no one honked or yelled wildly. Everyone patiently stood there. It wasn't until late that a Frenchman from a waiting car tried to help the German couple (who were also a bit older). They seemed to be in contact with the parking lot central office through the phone and had communication difficulties. The French woman was also experiencing difficulties handling the parking ticket, she was desperate. Eventually, the barrier at the VW opened and the waiting drivers all joined the free lane. That's when I saw that some drivers just held their parking ticket under a red scanner light and were able to drive through, while others scanned the ticket and then inserted their bank card and drove. With this knowledge, I went to the French woman and took control of everything. Her parking ticket was already completely crumpled because she was cramming it into all the slots possible. Slot for the bank card, slot for the receipt, slot for cash,...! I now showed her the red scanner light, took her debit card, pulled out the receipt, and the gate opened! Madame drove away! Based on these experiences, I didn't want to pay at the machine (waiting times longer than 15 minutes, what happens then at the barrier?), but I did look into the prices and conditions there. And lo and behold, I found a mention of a weekend rate. If you enter after 2:00 PM on Friday and exit by 12:00 PM on Monday, you only pay €19! At least, that's how it was explained in French, but I can! We were standing right in front of this ticket machine on Monday around 11:00 AM and wanted to pay. However, the machine had a sign saying that there were problems and we should pay directly at the exit. We can't describe our astonishment when we found out after scanning the red light that our price was €177.56. Seriously? So we reversed out of the exit, luckily we didn't create a line that would have made us even more frantic, and went to the machine. There, we had identified a phone number and after a few redirects, we got a young lady on the phone. She asked us to drive to the barrier and let her know when we were there. So we went there and called, but that's not what she meant, because you could also reach the lady in the central office by pushing a button on the scanner box. Now we had to sit in the car and suddenly a receipt came out of the box. When we pulled it out, the barrier opened and we were free. Parked for free in Dijon, with a shocker, not bad!? But there will surely be a small section soon about parking in France, because it's wonderful to observe here, definitely worth its own TV series!

In any case, we had no problems driving on the highways to Lyon, although we had to pay tolls again. Here, we found our Hotel Helder without major difficulties, despite the one-way street-heavy traffic layout. The area seemed very Neukölln-like, but the hotel had the standard we expected. Only parking turned out to be a problem again! All the streets had parking meters that wanted €30 for 5 hours in a row, but only €4 for 2 hours! So we fed the meter for 2 hours first and checked in. Unfortunately, the reception couldn't help us either, we only got a tip for Karin's foot pedicure. During the search, we delved deeper and deeper into the world of Africans and Arabs, and when policemen, who secured a central square as their base, pointed out the safety of our backpacks to us, we quickly left this part of the city. The streets and paths could best be described as multicultural in terms of shops and services, and Karin would never enter one of the beauty studios. The metro took us to the tourist information center, and here we found out where there might still be free parking spaces. So we strolled along the Saone River back towards the hotel. In doing so, we passed through a university district, which was the exact opposite of our recent experiences. So we were living on the border between poor and hip, between beggars and well-off young people who populated the many small bars in the university area. Each one was very crowded, and enjoying a cold drink together in the evening is simply part of the daily routine. We were right in the middle of it, but only after we had actually parked the car 'for free'. Super and even confirmed by a car mechanic who had his shop opposite. Goodbye, Wilde Hilde!