Nice, FR

We’ve found ourselves back in the south of France, this time in Nice in the Côte d’Azur area. The overnight sleeper from Paris to Nice was comfortable enough, where we shared a 4 bed (2 bunk) cabin with an elderly couple, so it was definitely quiet enough and easier on the back and neck than the other overnight train from San Sebastian to Lisbon.

I was curious to see if Nice would be how I remembered it the last time I was here with Mom, Dad & Camille. There were some parts that I remembered clearly, like the main market area, and other parts I was surprised that I didn’t remember, like how there are pebble beaches rather than sandy beaches.

One thing that I did enjoy the second time around was walking around the old town, eating the wonderful cuisine (I’ve been loading up on mussels again) and strolling down the promenade overlooking the Mediterranean in the evening.

We later on watched Ronin and realized that the car chase scene goes by the place where we had pizza, and spaghetti with mussels. If you have the movie, check it out.

We planned on a day excursion out to Èze  on the weekend and after finally finding the appropriate bus stop for ligne 82, going in the right direction, we arrived just before noon.

While parts of Nice were vaguely familiar to me, Èze on the other hand was exactly as I remembered it.

This little village was exactly what I was describing to Dan prior to our departure from Calgary. It was still fun to look at the little shops and art galleries, although we probably spent most of our time eating and drinking at a cafe while writing in our journals.

We also wanted to mail ourselves a postcard, but unfortunatley the post office closed at noon, so we slipped the postcard through the slot with enough force to overshoot the box in the post office and land on the floor with 1 Euro taped to it, and a note saying, “..pour Canada s’il vous plait!! :)” – we’ll see if it gets to Canada or not.

Probably the best part of the day was then taking the The Nietzsche Trail from the village down to the train station. According to the sign, it should only take 45 minutes and as with every trail that had a suggested time, we booked it down (being as competitive as we were). We did pause for a moment at a few lookouts to take photos and meanwhile we played a game where one would name a town/city we visited and the other had to say a few words that come to mind when they think of that place – kind of like the opposite of Taboo. Before we knew it, we made it down and just in time to catch the train back to Nice.

On our last full day, we did a day trip out to Monaco-Monte Carlo from the train station (Gare Riquier) near our hotel. The train was predictably packed, but luckily it was only a short ride.

When we stepped out of the Monaco station, we were greeted by the harbour and expensive yachts.

Dan wanted to take a photo with the yachts, as Dad E had requested, so as we made our way towards Hotel de Paris, we stopped to take some shots of the million dollar boats.

I was eager to show Dan the casino, the expensive shops and the place where a guard stood to direct the ‘cool cars’ through the road leading to Hotel de Paris and the casino and turning down the ‘not so cool cars’, directing them to the back road.

Unfortunately there weren’t as many expensive cars parked there. Well, there were the BMWs, Mercedes, Audis, but I was looking for the Lamborghinis and Ferraris. Luckily enough I found my future car, in pearl white, waiting for me in front of a nearby hotel – an Astin Martin … *drool*. By this time I was really starved, so we stopped at a restaurant overlooking the harbour to enjoy some more seafood on my part.

The second half of the day we climbed the steps to the lookout on the other side of the harbour, towards the Palace and old town. We took some shots of the sea and city and wandered around a bit.

I took Dan to the cathedral where Princess Grace was laid to rest.

We also had a peek at the real estate and found a 45 square meter apartment for 3.5 million euro, which was the running average price – so much for that idea…

Dan and I were wondering if I had properly visited these places, since they were excursions from a cruise ship the first time I came here. Without a doubt, Eze and Monaco-Monte Carlo were enough the first time around. Nice, on the other hand, I felt like there was a little more to see than what was provided during the cruise excursion. Tomorrow we’ll be leaving bright and early to start a new chapter of our European leg. We are officially saying goodbye to France, although we would love to come back some day. And we will be joining up with Mom and Dad K in Italy. We’ve booked our tickets from Nice to Milan and will have to ‘wing it’ and try to meet up with the folks by 4:30pm tomorrow at the Meina train station.