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In the spirit of impulse weekends, my flatmate and I decided to flee London and head for some sunshine....

Nice and the Côte d'Azur

Nickjenkins
2003-11-20 14:57:43

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quite sure of the final result but the bars that night were still full of triumphant, cavorting Frenchmen.

That evening we ventured out for dinner and went about 20m across the other side of the main square to another local restaurant. The food was excellent and this time accompanied by a decent bottle of Côtes du Rhone red. I had an Italian style pizza, wafer thin with ham, tomato and an large fried egg in the middle. The chef apart from his culinary pursuits also indulged in motorsport as well. The walls of the restaurant featured a couple of photographs of a works rally Citrôen in full flight and in the corner of the room his helmet sat on a pedestal. I wasn't able to determine if he had been driver or navigator but he had certainly seemed to enjoy it. That concluded our trip to Saint Andres Les Alpes and the next morning we arose and boarded the train for Nice, slightly heavier than when we had arrived.

The train trip to Nice was as scenic as the trip out but left us in Nice with nearly eight hours to kill before we were to fly home. Our first thought was to try the Musée d'Art Moderne et d'Art Contemporain (MAMAC) in the middle of Nice. The Musée contains modern 'masterworks' such as Andy Warhol's "Campbell's Soup Can" and "Entablature" a shopping trolley wrapped by Christo. Unfortunately we had not taken into account the fact that May 1st is as much a holiday for the French as it was for the English. Consequently all the Museums were closed, including the MAMAC.

Instead we detoured out to the Chateau atop the hill at the Eastern end of Nice's vast beach to take some photographs of the town. Walking down into the town from the Chateau we came into the Vieux Nice proper with narrow streets and old buildings. We found a little square opposite the church lined with restaurants and paused for lunch. Here we got some evidence which makes me suspect the French reputation of world class lovers is well deserved. While we sat eating lunch, a man walked past our table obviously intent on celebrating the onset of Spring. He padded past our table, barefoot and dressed in his bath robe clutching in one hand a bottle of wine and in the other a single rose.

After that we spent a few pleasant but pointless hours on the beachfront reading, paddling in the water and taking coffee in a café. We should have booked an earlier flight but managed to kill a few hours in the sunshine so all was not lost.

The trip home was marred by the fact we had ignored the problems of returning to Stanstead airport at midnight on a Bank holiday. None of the trains were running on time and more delays meant we didn't see home before 2am. Stanstead Parkway rail station is not the place to spend forty minutes on Monday night. It was also marred by the fact that Mark ate something severely poisonous on the last day and spent most of his time in the airport and on the plane shuttling between his seat and the bathroom in a desperate attempt to empty his stomach.

Still it was one of the nicest weekends away and I will be returning to the south of France quite soon, for food or the coffee if nothing else.

[NJ] As an aside, Many years later I heard from the owner of the house on top of the hill-of-the-saints. He had come across my web site and recognised my description of the location. Apparently the houses were for sale, they may still be if you are interested...

Sunday, 7 May 2000 18:12:32 PST

My travels