I arrived at Nice on Wednesday and the first thing I did was head straight for the beach. 4 weeks of straight rain between Paris and Amsterdam will do that to you. And on my way straight to the beach, I bought a fun floppy sun hat. Wrinkles on the tummy are ok because who's going to see my stomach at 80 anyways? But faces need to be treated with care.
I heard the French Riviera beaches were rocky, but I was sort of picturing Croatian rocky, which meant big slabs of stone, not skipping stone size pebbles.
Skipping stone size is pretty painful. It takes a full 10 minutes to get situated and toss all the pointy or big rocks out from underneath your towel. And just as you're starting to convince yourself that you are somewhat comfortable, a crowd of loud teenagers gathers around your head, hidden beneath your sun hat, and decide to set up camp their just standing in a circle talking for 30 minutes. But when you peak out from under your hat to see why they won't leave or when they might, you happen to catch the eye EVERYTIME of some women who's topless, who looks at you like you are being rude because you're staring at her toplessness, which in fact you sort of are. But not to cast judgment or gawk, just to take in the reality of the situation.
She also gave me the evil eye when I pulled my camera out. I was NOT intending to take her toplessness picture, it just so happened that she was in my perfect view of the scenery. But no worries, I cropped her out for you. Hope I didn't miss any other surprises. There were lots of them :-)
I thought a bit about the toplessness thing while chilling on the beach. When I took up swimming a couple years back, at first I was sort of shocked by the nude showers we all shared afterwards in the locker room. But I kind of began to appreciate them. It fills with you with a sense of o.k.ness about your body because you see reality at all ages, not the super model rarities. It's healthy for one's body image. Well, if you go to Nice, both men and women can enjoy being filled with a healthy body image :-) a lot!
Antibes
Thursday since Ryan wasn't going to arrive til later in the afternoon, I took the bus to Antibes, where I went to the market, which is a thing I've learned to love since my all-over-France trip.
I got:
- a tapenade mix with olives, sun dried tomatoes, garlic, mint and some other spices
- cerises (cherries)
- tomatoes and carrots (to ensure my daily allowance of veggies)
- cheese. Fribourg. It's a hard Swiss cheese. A new one to add to my like list.
- green olives provencale flavored
- and a baguette in which to enjoy it all with
Unfortunately I won't have kitchen access for a while. The food market extends to a clothes and antique market just outside. Notice my floppy hat :-)
Ryan's Here!
When I met up with Ryan I told him to change into some medium nice clothes because we were going to head down to the ritziest hotel in Nice, Hotel Negresco. We rented some bikes and rode on down the promenade to our destination.
After cajoling the door bouncer to let us in (they now have a policy against sightseeing in their hotel) we caught a picture of the lobby.
And then on returning the bikes as dusk was approaching, I thought this was gorgeous. It was a hazyish evening and the water, so still, just blended perfectly into the sky. Both were a grey, purple color. See if you can find the water line.
Monaco
Friday we headed to Monaco. The Grand Prix has been going on and since tickets were way too pricey - 100+ euros just for a standing spot on some cliff in which you might not even be able to see - we opted to not go for the race but see the other things in the city. BUT when we got there on Friday, it just happened to be right during the time of one of the GP2 races (one level lower than Formula 1) and we just happened to be climbing up the cliff to the palace as it started and had a perfect view of the racetrack.
So we watched for an hour. The coolest parts were when a car would crash and they'd take this big crane and lift the car into the air to get it out of the racetrack. And the 2 second tire changes - we timed it. But since all the announcements were in French, we weren't 100% sure what was going on. Somebody won, but don't ask me who or from what country, if that even matters.
Then we continued on uphill to the beautiful gardens around Monaco-Ville.
And went to the aquarium on the cliff that Jacques Cousteau designed and oversaw for 20 years.
Did you know that those flat fish that swim horizontally and camouflage themselves in the ground only camouflage themselves on the side with their eyes and if they get blinded, they are incapable of camouflaging themselves? These aren't camouflaging fish, but thought they were rad because the black and white ones just float there in place motionless. Fish can do that because they have compartments in their belly that monitor buoyancy.
Outside the aquarium, the palace and view from up top were cool.
And then we peaked inside the Monte-Carlo casino, but mostly drooled over the cars parked outside.
Chagall
I was pretty excited to go to the Chagall museum because I knew I liked his work. They didn’t give us much info about the artist – other than he didn’t die til 1985 so he’s pretty recent – but I’m going to go ahead and assume he was Jewish based on the fact that he has Jewish elements in all or most of his paintings. He also includes animals like goats and roosters which I’m not 100% sure what they’re supposed to mean, but will have to look it up.
Anyway, I like the ethereal, colorful, and bold way he paints.
He also did stained glass.
I wish you could see it in person because it was brilliant. It’s about the creation. I know. I didn’t get that either, but whatev. You can sort of see Adam and Eve with a snake in the left window.
Villefranche sur Mer
As our last beach stop in the
We stopped into a bakery for lunch and I enjoyed my last quiche lorraine from
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