Thanks to everyone who helped me plan our trip to Lille! It was fantastic. Beware, food talk below and I know it's long, but I appreciated the Lille advice and wanted to post what we did, which really was a lot of walking around.
Day one, we arrived by train in the morning from Antwerp by way of the SNCB train, cost was about 15 euros and took about 1:15. We stayed at the Aparthotel Adagio Lille Centre Grand Place, an easy 10 minute walk from the train station. Very nice room, with a full refrigerator and a kitchenette, nice shower, and a comfortable bed. There are two supermarkets close to there, we went there first. Then we walked around the city and ended up at a restaurant called Oh Gourmand'In. It was close to when they were closing, but the manager (owner?) kindly let share a salad with goat cheese and bacon which was delicious. Lille is so walkable, and everyone we met was friendly. We continued to walk around, in the evening we first went to a place called Bocal Fish & More and had a tiny fish appetizer. We sat beside a father and son and talked to them while there, so much fun and so friendly. From there we had a late dinner at a very busy pizza place called Papa Raffale. Walking back to our place about 11pm was great, the city was lit up with beautiful lights.
Day two we started the day at The French Bastards patisserie for quiche and a croissant like pastry with ham and cheese. From there we went to the wonderful Palais des Beaux-Arts de Lille, the fine arts museum. Great museum, we spent four hours there, though no descriptions were in English. The L'apparition de la Famille de L'artiste painting there may be my favorite Marc Chagall painting, and the relief plans downstairs of different cities are amazing. We needed a snack so we had a shrimp salad and duck sushi at Bistro Tao. After this my wife Karen got her haircut by Alexandre at the Alexandre Bruno salon right across the street from our hotel, it was a great experience. From there we went to Bibi’s Cafe in Place du General DeGaulle for a drink to celebrate, a tourist spot but that was alright. We walked around more after that and ended the night having dinner at the L Bistrot de la Ch’Tite Brigitte, one of the estaminet dining spots for local food. We had the croquettes de crevettes and the tasty croque au maroilles cheese and egg dish!
Day three we went to the train station to take the train to La Piscine in Roubaix. This museum of ceramics, decorative arts and painting in a former swimming pool building was so unique and a great experience, it was between that and the Louvre Lens, and we are glad we went to the Piscine. We spent about three hours there, came back and went to see our new friend Lilian who worked at a place call Le Lys, another touristy place and had a drink there. Then we walked to places we had not been and ended up at Ya's Pizza Bar and had a Lebanese dish called man'ouché, pizza dough with thyme, sesame, and olive oil) which was good. We then walked back to the estaminet area, and went to a place called Estaminet Au Soyeux. We got the plate of the "Silk" an assortment of Lil regional specialties on one plate: Flemish carbonnade, Welsh rarebit, potjevleesch, and chicken with the Maroilles cheese.
We left the next day, but not before the best quiche I had ever had at boulangerie Maison Papillon. We loved Lille, and while we couldn't do all we wanted, we treated it as a chill place to relax. We hope to return!