Lille France Grande Braderie Flea Market.

Everyone knows the phrase "SHOP TILL YA DROP", well Mason and I know exactly what that is all about. But I'll start at the beginning.. We arrived at the hotel around 9:30pm on Friday night. Easy drive over. Took us about 5 1/2 hours to get there. We would of made it in 4 1/2 but we ran into an hour delay from road construction.. anyway, got up Saturday and we were out the door by 9:30am. Found the Park and Ride with no problems, then learned all about the metro system. That was fun.. There was no one in the station to help us and of course everything was in French. After some time of watching all the people, we decided to just jump on the next one that came around.. Worked out just great... Took us to the main station in down town Lille.

The flea market dates back to medieval times and anyone can grab a corner of pavement to sell their wears. There was at least 10,000 stalls as some call them.

One of the favorite things to do is eat Mussels and Fries.. Last year over 500 tons of mussels were consumed... The restaurants have a contest on who can sell the most Mussels and to prove who does, they put the shells in a pile, and who ever has the biggest pile wins... No, Mason and I didn't help out on that contest....

We walked and walked and walked.. probably around 10 miles the first day... and we were there for 12 hours. It was fabulous treasure

hunting times.... Mason was in heaven.. there were so many antique clocks that it was crazy... nothing like what he has ever seen... Me on the other hand, it wasn't really the girly stuff that I hoped to find.. Oh, I found some things, but not much.

At night it's like one huge party... People singing in the streets and lots of people drinking and having a great time...

We got back to our hotel around 11:00pm the first night.. We were beat... took us a while to find the main metro station and figure out which one to get on.. that was crazy too... Neither one of us speak any French, and the people we asked for help couldn't speak any English...

Anyway, we went back for more the next day... The metro was a breeze the second time around...Once you become a world traveler on how to use the metro system.. LOOK OUT.... This time we got off right where the antique stalls are. That saved us walking through the whole city... That was real nice... We pretty much stayed in this section the whole day.. Found more treasures....

The streets were wall to wall people. Both days, up and down all the main and side streets throughout the whole down town.. Besides the shopping I enjoyed the old buildings and churches.. It's amazing, that back in the day they could build such beautiful buildings. Oh, and I enjoyed listening to the french people talk and being called Mademoiselle.... It was pretty cool... I'd love to be able to speak French... What else... bathrooms.. there weren't any around... I'm not sure what people did... don't know if I want to know...

The food was amazing..

This dessert table is truly sinful.. I didn't try any of these, not that I didn't want too .. but one can only be so bad...

Now the olives didn't do much for me..

I've never seen so many different kinds of olives and the smell wasn't appealing to me either..
I just kind of wanted to hold my breath as I walked on by..




Although, I like cheese, I didn't try any of this.

Didn't look to appetizing to me...

This is Lille...

She is one of my treasures.. When I saw her, I thought she looked So French that she would be a nice reminder of our trip to Lille.. She is a reproduction, made by an artist that does a limited amount of each statue...

Our trip was truly amazing.. After three nights in the hotel and two full days of walking, we left dead tired and decided not to go the extra miles to the English Channel.. That will have to wait for our England adventure.

We enjoyed our drive home as we talked about our treasures we bought, the one's we would of liked to have had but couldn't get in the car, the one's that cost way to much money... the people, the metro system and all the other experiences of our travel...

For me it's pepsi time.. for all of those I love, it's nighty night.....