InterRail part 3: Lisses

I had a wonderful chance to spent one day of our InterRail by training in Lisses and Evry, which is quite surprising for we had a really tight schedule during our journey.

For those who do not know what I'm talking about Lisses and Evry are the birthplaces of parkour and nowadays almost a Mecca for many traceurs. I have to admit that my journey to Lisses did open my eyes in many ways. Before our journey I had read on several message boards that one should need a guide to find all of the most famous spots. I didn't have the change to contact any local practitioners so my only option was to discover by myself what Lisses and Evry had to offer and suprisingly everything was really easy to find.

To get to Lisses I took the RER train from Paris to Evry Courcouronnes. And with my makeshift map drawn in my notebook I was able to navigate myself to la Dame du Lac. It did feel quite unbelievable to experience all the spots, especially la Dame du Lac after seeing it in so many videos, I needed a couple of minutes just to realize that I truly was in Lisses.

After sitting by the Dame du Lac for a while I followed my intuition and started to walk in a completely random direction. For a while I already thought that I was lost until I run up with the escaliers of the local gym. Then I turned around and saw the school, and right next to it was the famous cat-to-cat spot and the other famous white buildings again featured in numerous videos. I was quite shocked how close to each other all of the spots were, they were almost literally next to each other. I was also surprised how different all of the distances were: Most of the drops where not as high as I had thought. On the other hand most o the walls where a lot higher than what I had imagined.

From Lisses I continued my way to Evry where I again without any greater difficulties was able to find the manpower gap and also the walls behind the Cathedral. I was also lucky enough to see some Belgium traceurs. The only downside was that we were both already heading back to Central Paris.

All in all Lisses was really quiet and tranquil, which is probably one of the factors that has caused the birth of parkour: there really isn't a lot to do, especially if you are a teenaged boy. The presence of parkour can also be easily seen, although not in the most positive way. Everywhere I could see lots of signs which forbade climbing  or entering at all at an area. I felt quite sad that it had come to that. I do understand the perspective of the people in Lisses. They are just trying to live their everyday live when there are constantly coming people from all over the world to jump and climb and occasionally breaking things or at least leaving their footmarks on the walls. I personally wasn't really in the mood for training. Mainly because of all the signs and the overall negative atmosphere but also because I had already traveled with my 20kg + backpack for over two weeks, so naturally my legs weren't in the best possible condition.

I am not sure when I am going back to Lisses. The next time I visit Lisses I will probably try to contact the local traceurs so I could better see the way people train there. All in all I have rather mixed feelings off my visit to Lisses, and I really hope that there could be a better understanding between the traceurs and the authorities in the future.