Final-year school trip to Lyon and the Alps: Fourvière, Pérouges, Grenoble, the Vercors and the Chartreuse (7 days)

Day 1: Departure from your school and arrival in Lyon

• Departure from your school early in the morning, at the agreed time, and daytime drive to Lyon via Luxembourg and Burgundy (about 680 km from Brussels, 7½ hours’ driving excluding stops), with two drivers on board.
• Our drivers drive for a maximum of 3 hours, then take a 30-minute break, day and night.
• Lunch at your own expense on the way.
• Arrival in the late afternoon and check-in at the accommodation in or around Lyon for three nights; dinner and quiet evening.

Day 2: Fourvière, Old Lyon and the Presqu’île

• Funicular up Fourvière hill: the basilica, the panorama over the city and the Roman theatres of Lugdunum.
• Down to Old Lyon, the UNESCO-listed Renaissance quarter, and discovery of its traboules, covered passageways running through the buildings.
• Lunch at your own expense, then walk across the Presqu’île, from Place Bellecour to Place des Terreaux and the town hall.
• Dinner and supervised evening.

Day 3: Croix-Rousse, the Lumière brothers and Confluence

• Up to the Croix-Rousse, the hill of the canuts, the silk workers, and stop at the Mur des Canuts, a huge trompe-l’œil mural.
• Visit to the Institut Lumière, in the villa of the inventors of the cinematograph, where the first film was shot (on request).
• Lunch at your own expense, then visit to the Musée des Confluences, devoted to science and human societies (on request).
• Supervised free time in the Parc de la Tête d’Or, then dinner and supervised evening.

Day 4: Pérouges and arrival in Grenoble

• Rooms vacated after breakfast and drive to Pérouges (about 40 min), a medieval town of cobbled lanes and stone houses.
• Lunch at your own expense, with a chance to taste the local galette de Pérouges, then drive to Grenoble (about 1½ hrs).
• Cable car in its famous ‘bubbles’ up to the Bastille fort, facing the Belledonne peaks (on request).
• Check-in at the accommodation in or around Grenoble for three nights; dinner and supervised evening.

Day 5: The Vercors, between cliffs and caves

• Drive to Pont-en-Royans (about 1 hr) and its houses suspended above the Bourne river.
• Visit to the Choranche caves, with their underground river and thousands of slender stalactites (on request).
• Lunch at your own expense, then a short supervised walk at the foot of the Vercors cliffs.
• Return to Grenoble (about 1 hr), dinner and supervised evening.

Day 6: The Chartreuse massif

• Drive to Saint-Pierre-de-Chartreuse (about 50 min) over the Col de Porte.
• Visit to the Grande Chartreuse Museum, devoted to the life of the Carthusian monks (on request).
• Lunch at your own expense, then a supervised walk towards the monastery, seen from a distance in its silent valley.
• Return to Grenoble, supervised free time in the centre, then dinner and last supervised evening.

Day 7: Return to your school

• Rooms vacated after breakfast, luggage loaded into the coach.
• Departure early in the morning and daytime drive to Belgium via Lyon and Burgundy (about 790 km to Brussels, 9 hours’ driving excluding stops), with two drivers on board.
• Lunch at your own expense on the way and regular stops.
• Arrival at your school in the evening.