travel guide: Reims

Rue du Mars

Viime viikolla käytiin pikareissulla Reimsissä katsastamassa paikalliset joulumarkkinat. Alkuperäisenä suunnitelmana oli Strasbourg, mutta neljän tunnin automatka ei oikein kiinnostanut. Reims osoittautuikin oikein mukavaksi matkakohteeksi, sinne pääsee helposti junallakin Pariisista vain 45 minuutissa. Tässä muutamia matkavinkkejä (tällä kertaa englanniksi, sillä en jaksanut kirjoittaa kaikkea kahteen kertaan!) jos ikinä satutte suuntaamaan Reimsiin!

Last week we did a quick trip to Reims, a lovely french city about 150 km from Paris. We planned to go to Strasbourg but at the end we decided against the 4 hour drive, whereas you can easily visit Reims in only one or two days as it's much closer to Paris (only 1h15 by car or 45 min by train). So, if you ever happen to head up to Reims, here's some tips!

Christmas market

Opéra de Reims

SEE & DO

- Notre-Dame of Reims Cathedral The famous cathedral where many kings of France were crowned. Next to the cathedral you can find The Palace of Tau, the residence of the Kings of France before their coronation.

- Reims Christmas Market, the Place d'Erlon The famous Christmas market where you can spend hours drinking hot wine and doing some christmas shopping.

- There's nice app made by the tourist office of Reims, just download it and you'll get a lot of info about all the most important sightseeing spots.

Café du Palais

Les halles du Boulingrin

EAT & DRINK

- Les Halles du Boulingrin, 50 rue du Mars (open Wed 7 am - 1 pm, Fri 7 am- 1 pm & 4 pm - 8 pm, Sat 6 am - 2 pm) Reims' main food market takes places in this beautiful building in Art Deco style. There's also a couple nice of coffee shops/restaurants in the building. In the nearby streets (especially Rue de Mars and Rue du Temple) there's plenty of coffee places, brasseries, delis, pastry shops etc!

- Café du Palais, 14 Place Myron Herrick Great atmosphere if you like the old fashioned brasserie look! 

- Near the Christmas market you can find many traditional brasseries and coffee places.

Regional specialities

SHOP 

- Regional specialities include champagne, pink biscuits (called biscuits roses) and gingerbread. You can find these in many shops, and you can even visit a champagne fabricant or the most famous fabricant of pink biscuits, Le Fossier.

- Pop Up Store Local Designers, 37 Rue des Capucins Every christmas local young designers organize this small but lovely pop up shop where you can find all kinds of gifts.

- Les fees du style, 81 Rue Chanzy I didn't get a chance to visit this shop but I've heard it's great. It carries many Scandinavian decoration brands such as Bloomingville. 

- Le nid de la pie, 5 Rue Clovis this great shop sells everything you need to make your own jewelry. The best part? You can even make them at the shop so you don't need to buy all the tools and the staff is very willing to help! I hope we had this shop also in Paris.

Pop Up Store at Rue Chanzy

GETTING AROUND

- Car
We rented a car to get around. It was sometimes hard to find a parking place but otherwise it was a good way of getting around.

- Walking
City's not that big so you can definitely walk around!

- Public transport
Trams and buses run frequently and are cheaper than in Paris!

+ STAY

- We stayed at a place we found from the AirBnB. After a day spent strolling down the alleys of the christmas market it was really nice to have an entire place for oneself, make some tea and curl up on the sofa.

Museum of Fine Arts

Hope you liked this small guide and don't hesitate to comment if you have any questions. Have a great weekend  everybody!