Nik's Travel Blogs: Lille

For casual travelers Lille trip may not be as exciting as Paris or Lyon, but Lille was an exciting tour for us. It was the first tour in our Euro tour season and left us a very cool or rather chill experience.

Since we were not sure whether we can go out of France without OFII we started off our Euro tour with French states. Lille was the first location shortlisted by us. We had heard somewhere that you can stay in stations at night we planned such that we will stay back at Lille station at night. It’s only at 12 am that we got to know that we had to vacate the station and landed up in one of the benches and had 6 hours ahead of us in open air. Being in the Northern France, the temperature was touching 10 degree Celsius. Undoubtedly it was one of the longest nights in life.

Apart from the chilling experience, the best part of Lille was the visit to zoo. One of the attractions of the Lille as per the travel guide was Parc Loisirs de la Citadelle, which includes a zoo along with a playground and lot of rides for children. Though we never planned to visit the zoo, we found that the entry to the zoo was free and decided to check it out to kill time. The zoo houses lot of endangered animals and red panda was on the main attractions there.

Another tourist attraction is Place Général de Gaulle aka Grand' Place. You can find cobblestoned streets with lot of boutiques & resto - cafes. Those interested can visit the Opera house & Palais des Beaux Arts. You can also find lot of buildings and cathedral built in Gothic style.

Last but not the least must visit place in Lille to me is Meert, one of France’s most famous patisserie (bakery). Do try out few waffles from Meert. All in all it’s not a must visit place and you should explore Lille only if you happen to have spare time in your Euro trip schedule or you are staying in Lille.

Pics from Lille trip

Red Panda..Lille Zoo