Monthly Archives: November 2014

Day 4 Vence

Day 3 Nice

Pastries and coffee at the cafe, quick email check. Then down into the port area to check out a “bric-a-brac” market. We also walked to a plaza nearby where there was a farmer’s market happening. We bought some food for dinner

Today we are going into Nice. There is a big market in the old town along Cours Seleya that we had seen the last time we were in France. I really wanted to see it again.

Flowers at the Nice market

Plaza in central Nice

Near the market in Nice

Drove into town and found a parking lot near the market. This market extends for several blocks. There’s a flower market for about a block. Then a couple of blocks of mostly food with some stalls selling non-food objects. Mostly I think the latter are for tourists. There are restaurants lining either side of the wide road the market is in. The place is full of people. Most seem to be locals doing their shopping but there are definitely a large number of folks like us, tourists. Very crowded, many products to view and interesting smells.

After walking the length and buying a few things, we came back to a shop that sold clothing and table clothes. Bought a few things. Then we strolled to one of the side streets an uncrowded restaurant. Doug had pasta carbonera and Tai had antipasti platter. As we returned to our car, we walked through the market again. Only this time, it was closing up and everything was being taken away. A lot of work to set up and take down for a few hours six days a week.

Our next stop was the Matisse museum outside the city center. The museum is in a beautiful Mediterranean mansion in a large olive grove. The park is heavily used by people just enjoying the outdoors. Walking, picnicking, playing boules with kids on bicycles riding around. The museum itself had a fairly wide range of Matisse’s works including his cutouts, sketches and a few sculptures. There was also a room displaying sketches of his Chapel of the Rosary which we were going to visit the next day.

Matisse museum

Doug at Matisse museum after lot’s of walking.

Next to the Matisse Musee was an archaeologic museum that uncovered an ancient Roman military camp. This was very interesting to see all the ruins and an open Roman arena.

Inside archaeological museum

Roman ruins outside of Matisse museum

On our way back to the car we passed by a public museum of a Franciscan monastery. Looked inside the church and then walked around the large cemetery. This was interesting because of the number of “family crypts” all crowded together.

Crypt in cemetery

Cemetery at the Franciscan museum

Franciscan museum

Then back to our apartment where Tai fixed a very nice dinner of food that we had purchased that morning. Easy lights out.

Day 2 Eze & Cap Ferrat

Day 1 Monaco

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Got up curiously looked out on the balcony window at the fantastic view of the Villefranche-Sur-Mer village, the small bay and port. Newly parked in the middle of the bay was a huge cruise ship.

Cruise ship in the bay

There were little boats ferrying the people to shore. I think the passengers then wandered off on side trips throughout the French Riviera, some probably to Nice and, as we found later, some to Monaco and Monte Carlo. We needed to start our day soon before the town was invaded by boat tourist.

Made our way up to a small plaza where we bought croissants, expresso and decaf cappuccino. Turns out Villefranche provides free wifi in that area. That was a good thing because the wifi that was supposed to be at the apartment didn’t exist. The box was ordered and still had not been delivered. So from the cafe, we were able to check email but didn’t feel like doing blogging or looking at the news from the cell phone.

Today we took the train from Villefranche to Monaco. The first, most obvious thing was how quiet the train was. BART is an embarrassment. This electric train did not screech. You could carry on a conversation in a normal voice and the ride was very smooth.

Tai with Monaco in the background

Monaco and Monte Carlo, playground of the rich, famous and 007. Everything is either uphill or downhill and very, very steep. So the walk from the train station was all downhill. We headed into town and up on the big rock where the palace is located. At noon, there was the changing of the guard. 6 soldiers with rifles, 2 drummers, 2 buglers and an officer. Very ceremonial as they changed places with the guys who had been on duty. Duty involved one or two soldiers walking back and forth in front of the palace, very formal procedure.

The palace

The new guard arriving

Then back into the plaza at the foot of the rock for some sandwich (jambon and brie) lunch. After lunch we walked to the Jardin Exotique which was located at the top of Monaco’s hillside. All very steeply uphill. Interestingly, there are public elevators in places to help you up the hillside but unfortunately they are not everywhere. Exotique is basically a cactus and succulents garden. The view of Monaco from this garden was spectacular!

View of Monaco from the garden

Instead of hiking back downhill, we caught a bus just outside of the garden and went all the way to Monte Carlo.

A couple taking mariage photos

The stores in Monte Carlo are so upscale, for me, it was almost uncomfortable. Walked around and looked at the very expensive boats in the harbor. I tried to walk into a casino but they required that I remove my hat and day pack. I was not interested in doing this so we left. Walked by Monte Carlo Casino….very fancy and The Hermitage Hotel…. also very fancy. We walked around more and observed all the fancy-ness. Then we headed for the bus stop to Monaco and noticed that the bus stop benches were all made of marble! We got back to Monaco and headed up the hill to the train station and returned to Villefranche, appreciating this quaint, small, modest fishing village.

Took a short nap and went back down to the port area to look for dinner. We were still out of sync with French schedules. Shops open in the morning, then close around lunch. Restaurants open for lunch and then close. Shops open then close again. Then restaurants open again for dinner around 6pm. This is not precise and not all shops and restaurants follow it. Very confusing. We managed to find a restaurant for dinner. After eating dinner, we returned to the apartment and crashed real early, like 7pm.

Day 0 Arrival in France

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The flight to France was actually not too bad. We paid for economy comfort and that gave us lots of space. The seats we ok. We thought we were going to not have seat back entertainment system. That would have meant watching whatever movie was playing on the main screen. But it turned out not to be the case. So we have a selection of movies to watch. Managed to sleep some on the trans-atlantic portion.

Arrived in Nice and moved quickly through immigration. Then went to the car rental place. It was easy to pick up the car. Then came driving to our B&B in Villefranche-sur-mer. I am so thankful I ordered a GPS because we would never have made it. Even so, It was hard. Driving in France is not like driving in the US. The roads and lanes are very narrow. Motorcycles are whizzing around with little regard to lanes. It was kind of tense. I only missed a couple of turns. Fortunately the gps recovered and plotted a new route. Villefranche is small old village on the coast and so the streets are not laid out nicely for cars. Several wrong and missed turns later we arrived at the plaza where we were to meet Audrey. Found a parking place and Tai spotted Audrey right away. Her picture was part of the AIRBNB posting. Audrey guided us to the parking place that came with the apartment and helped us maneuver our baggage down the several flights of stairs and through winding “street” to the apartment. And what a lovely apartment. It was small but very nicely appointed. There was living/dining room and a bedroom through a large sliding door. We actually never closed the door. Both rooms had doors out to the balcony. Then there was the view from both rooms. The biggest selling point for the apartment. It overlooked the village and out to the bay. Really spectacular.

Audrey showed us around and then left us to enjoy. The major downside for this apartment was NO internet access. There was supposed to be but the box had not been received.