Grenoble; Saturday, 03 September, 2022

I had a nice lie in and a late breakfast in the hotel before heading out to have a wander around some of the nearby parks and gardens.

Opposite the Hotel was the Parc Paul Mistral which is home to the Tour Perret, the only remaining structure from the 1925 International Exhibition of Hydropower and Tourism that took place in the city, and was the first reinforced concrete tower to be built in Europe at it’s time of construction. It was originally an observation tower which must have had excellent views of the mountains from it’s top. However, the tower closed in the 1960s and has never reopened, today its clear to see that whilst restoration work is underway it is an uphill battle to save the tower with large parts of the outer concrete having crumbled away revealing the now rusting steel reinforcement underneath.

From the Parc Paul Mistral I crossed over the road to have a look around the small botanical gardens located in the Jardin des Plantes. The garden also houses the city’s natural history museum and some greenhouses, but both of those were already closed for lunch by the time I got to them.

I took that as a hit and wandered over a bit further into the centre of town, stopping off at the stunning Place de Verdun in the centre of the city before making my way over to the area near the cathedral to find a café to grab a quick lunch in.

After lunch I walked the short distance on to the Musée Grenoble – the city’s art gallery, located in another park that sits on the line of the old city walls and the gallery even includes parts of the old city walls in in structure.

I spent quite a bit of time wandering around the galleries which cover mostly French art, but also some earlier Flemish, Dutch and Italian art. The gallery is known for being one of the first galleries to focus on Modern French Art and has quite a large amount of 20th and 21st century works.

From the Gallery it was a short walk back to the Cathédrale Notre-Dame which I had a quick look around before wandering on down to the Place Grenette which was the starting point for the Petit Train tour of the city. Afterall, this wouldn’t be a French City without a Petit Train.

The tour lasted about 50 minutes and took in quite a bit of the city centre, including crossing the Isère twice, though given the commentary was only in French it was a bit lost on me.

I had a bit more of a wander around the city centre before heading back to my hotel to drop my day bag off and freshen up before heading back out for a quick dinner and then back to the hotel for an early night.