Is it worth a half day to check out Lille? I hear it is the Christmas capital of the world. Worth a trip? Better in the day or evening? Thanks for your help.

It depends on what interests you. I have changed trains in Lille may times, stayed for one night once. The old town has some interesting buildings, the Fine Art Museum is quite large with several old masters' works. I think it would be much more fun to visit during daytime, there wasn't much going on in the night while I was there.

I consider Lille to be one of the most interesting cities in France, sadly overlooked by all of the tourists who want to go south instead of north.

www.noel-a-lille.com/english.html

We go to Lille a few times a year, it is popular with tourists from the UK as it is easily reached on Eurostar for a weekend destination. It's definitely worth a trip IMO.

The Christmas market is not really anything special - quite commercial, few local or home-made goods and not that many stalls (though we did pick up some excellent apple brandy!).

However, there are some good shopping streets, and parts of the town are quite quaint, so I don't think you'd have any trouble amusing yourself for half a day there.