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Published: June 13th 2010
Wow it's been a while since we last blogged. We really don't have a better excuse than we've been too busy enjoying our time to write about it. Time to play catch up I guess.
June 5
Like all travel days so far, we got up early this morning, packed our things, and headed to the train station. We went over to Monterosso again because that’s where the Intercity train that took us to Genoa stopped at. We had about two hours in Monterosso, which I used to get a light breakfast at a restaurant on the beach. We boarded our train to Genoa, where we had to transfer to another train to Ventimiglia, a small town on the French-Italian border. We met a nice family from Virginia. They were traveling around Europe and their next stop was Monte Carlo. In Ventimiglia, we hopped on a train that went to France, but only to Monte Carlo, where we had to take yet another train to Nice. I have never taken so many trains in one day. We noticed that the regional trains in France were a lot nicer than the Italian ones. This was also the end of Italian language
Short Door
I guess there was nobody as tall as Filip when this castle was builtand the beginning of French language territory. I must say that I feel more familiar with Italian than French. I wish it would be the other way around, because Italians tend to speak English better than French. Communicating and understanding is certainly more difficult in France for me and it adds to the confusion in unfamiliar new places. We arrived to Nice at 6 pm and found our hotel - Hotel Wilson - without any problems. The hotel is on a fairly busy street with lots of shops. It is on third floor, 65 stairs up with no elevator. It is two blocks away from the old town and about 15 minute walk from the train station. It is in very good central location. Our room had blue walls and was decorated with Henry Matisse paintings and had a little balcony with a view of the rooftops, but the buildings around us were a little bit higher, so we couldn’t see very far. The room was okay but it could use some improvements. For example, the only place that had a wireless connection was a breakfast room, which was frequently locked in the evening, the hallway, which had no tables
and no chairs, and the stairs outside the hotel, where the light would automatically turn off after couple minutes. We ended up sitting on the stairs multiple times in the evening. The hotel had one interesting high-tech feature, the main door into the hotel opened by fingerprint scan. Some people had a problem remembering what finger to use, so I had to open the door for them with my finger, while I was sitting outside surfing the web.
After we got situated in our room, we went online and found a vegetarian restaurant - La Zucca Magica. It was by the marina, a ten minute walk from the hotel. We walked over there and were greeted by the owner. The place looked very nice, but the owner did not speak any English and there was no menu. There was also nobody else in the restaurant. I guess 7 pm is too early for dinner, because the place was still completely empty. I asked for the menu and the guy said something in French. We think he said they make only one dish each night for everybody that comes. We tried to explain that Molly was vegan, and we think he
Pizza Delivery
by motorcycle. said that the dish that he was serving tonight had cheese in it. We decided to leave.
When we got back to the hotel, I did not give up and found a vegan restaurant, which was conveniently only two blocks away. We walked over there, found it, and it was open! It was a tiny place with 3 or 4 tables. There was American and French flag at the entrance. The owner was an older lady who was very nice to us. She was the only person working there as a chef and also as a server. We think she was originally from California. The menu had a very limited selection with only 2 main courses to choose from. We had bread with pate for an appetizer, Molly ordered a veggie pie with salad, and I had a grain dish with salad. We ordered soy ice cream for dessert. She also told Molly where to find an organic food store. It was one block away on the same street.
After dinner, we went back to our hotel and found a small gathering of hotel guests and managers in the dining room having dinner, wine, and smoking cigarettes. When I came
Marina
Average size private yachts in the marina. into the room to use the Internet, they greeted me and gave me some wine. I found out that the young couple sitting across the table was from the Czech Republic and that they go to Nice for vacation every year. I talked to them and got some good tips for side trips. They also told me that buses were much cheaper than trains, which we later verified. Riding a bus to Antibes was 1 euro, whereas riding a train was 4 euros.
We wanted to go out to a club or a bar and listen to some music, since it was Saturday night. The hotel owners gave us some tips and a map and we headed out into the old town. The old town is the most interesting part of Nice. It is not very big, but the narrow streets are filled with restaurants, bars, clubs, and shops. The area was pretty busy at 11 pm and it looked like a great place to bar hop or party, but we did not find the place that our hotel owners recommended and we were getting tired after long day of traveling, so we decided to go back to our hotel
Wifi connection
Trying to get the wifi connection on the balcony so we don't have to go in the hallway. to get some sleep.
- Filip
June 6
Nice is packed with great bakeries and pastry shops. There is at least one on every block. When I woke up, I decided to take advantage of this and go out to get a croissant with coffee, but it was Sunday so it took some time to find one that was open. It was totally worth it. Pastries in France are awesome. To my surprise, not every pastry shop serves coffee, something that would not happen in Italy. I ended up getting an orange juice instead of coffee and went back to our hotel.
Our plan is to visit the Principality of Monaco for the day. We arrived at the bus stop located only two blocks from our hotel and figured out which bus we needed to take. After few minutes of waiting, the bus showed up, we paid 1 euro each, and we were on our way to Monaco. The bus was going along the coast and there was some beautiful scenery. The coast from Nice to Monaco is heavily populated, even though it is very rugged with steep hills dropping straight into the sea with not much space in between.
The unappealing side of Monaco
As you can see, not everything in the area looks five star, but you still pay five star prices. We saw a lot of magnificent yachts and some cruise ships along the way. The trip took about 45 minutes. Our plan was to visit the museum of Oceanography, but we didn’t know where exactly it was, and so we had no clue, which stop to get off at. Monaco is not that big - only about 3 km across, so it was not a big deal. Once we got off the bus, we set out to find the museum, walking along the coast in one direction. We later found out that the museum was the other way, but our mistake led us to Japanese Gardens and the Monte Carlo Casino. We tried our luck in the Casino. I put 5 euro in the Poker machine. I was doing well until I changed my strategy and bet everything at once. Molly tried her luck on some slot machine and that did not go too well either. Total damage was 9 euro, but we can say we gambled in Monte Carlo. The casino is really small compared to the casinos in Las Vegas. We did not even try to go into the main building, because we assumed we would need to
show up in a car that would resemble some that were parked in front of the entrance - Ferrari, (Rolls) Royce, Lamborghini, and Bentley - or be some well known celebrity. We bought our lunch in the supermarket and sat down on a bench in the marina to eat it and look at the huge yachts that were parked there. Vast majority of the huge boats were from Georgetown, Cayman Islands. I wonder what benefit it brings to have a boat registered in Cayman Islands? We finally made it to the museum of Oceanography after lunch. There were many fish tanks with small and big fish including sharks. We got there at a good time - there was a man feeding the fish. Second floor was dedicated to an exhibition of marine animals and various hunting gear collected by Price Albert more than 100 years ago during his many expeditions.
After the museum visit, we ventured into the old town and toward the Grimaldi Palace. Except for this small historic quarter, Monaco has a lot of new high buildings with not very impressive designs. We concluded that one time was enough and we don’t need to see it again. The
Market in Antibes
Come early, this market was nice, but they were packing up by the time we arrived just after noon. bus ride back to Nice was grueling, because the bus was crowded, there were no seat available, and we got stuck in traffic. We had to stand on the bus for more than 1 hour. I wished we would have paid extra and taken the train instead.
I looked up some good places in Nice to go for dinner, but all of them were closed on Sunday, so we ended up going to a random restaurant in the old town. I had seafood pasta and Molly got Ratatouille - vegetables cooked in some tomato sauce. We walked along the promenade by the beach. The promenade would be great for biking, roller skating or running. It’s really long and wide. The beach in Nice is not that great. It’s a pebble beach and there is no sand. I wrapped up the day with a scoop of gelatto that was made to be in the shape of a flower. It was very manly.
-Filip
June 7
Today the weather isn’t supposed to be as nice, so instead of doing our beach day today, we’re going to stay around Nice, and maybe see some museums. Filip had the breakfast offered at our hotel
today, and then we went by a Bio store (organic store) that the woman running the vegan restaurant had told us about. I stocked up on some food there, and we went back to the hotel to prepare for the day. While at breakfast Filip had also learned about an antique market that takes place on Monday mornings, and which museums people recommend in Nice. The Matisse museum is open today, but the contemporary art museum is closed, so we’ll have to try to go there if we’re in town tomorrow. We walked down to the antique market, which takes place in the old town area and looked around for a few minutes. Some things are nice, but most of it looked like junk. But I guess the saying does go, “one person’s trash is another person’s treasure.” After leaving the old town we walked all the way across town and up quite a few stairs to get to the Matisse Museum. It was a nice museum to go to for an hour and it was also nice that it was free. These admission charges to museums, galleries and cathedrals really start to add up, so including some free ones
can be a nice relief. I feel a bit spoiled because we are going to these museums and galleries that hold some very celebrated pieces of artwork, and I’m sure there are some people that would love to see what we’re seeing, and I just look at it and think, “huh?” We stopped by Marc Chagall’s art gallery on our way back toward our hotel, but decided not to go in because it cost a bit more, and we didn’t like his style based on the postcards in the gift shop. We thought about doing laundry and looked for places nearby, but decided just to relax for a bit instead and wait to do laundry in Avignon. We went again to the vegan restaurant Speakeasy for dinner. I had the potato and sweet potato pie, while Filip had the carrot and leeks with brown rice in an almond sauce. We also had the pate for a starter and I had a strawberry tart. The food there is very unique. It is all strictly vegan and she even tries to make many thinks like the crust for the dinner pie and the tarts gluten free. After dinner we came back to
the hotel and spent a long time posting blogs. It takes a long time for us to agree on what pictures to post. We hope tomorrow will be a nice day with some sun because we plan to go to Antibes and Cannes.
-Molly
June 8
The weather is sunny today. It looks like a good day for a trip to the beach. We heard good things about Antibes from multiple people and we would like to see Cannes as well. We had some breakfast and went to the bus station again. The bus ride to Antibes takes 1 hour and costs 1 euro. The bus was completely full and it got really hot, but at least we had seats. Antibes is a small town on the coast with a long history. The town is surrounded by walls, has a big marina, and a few sandy beaches. It is a nice vacation spot and a great place to relax. When we got there, it was almost noon. We went to the office of tourism, where they gave us a map and recommended a few things to see. We walked through the old town and made it just in time to
see the local market. There was a wide variety of products including fresh fruit and veggies, meats and cheeses, flowers, spices, olives, pastries, and other gourmet delicacies.
I got some sandwich and beer for lunch and ate it on the steps of the Picasso museum. Picasso used to live in this town for a short period of time in 1947, and he donated some paintings and sculptures to this place and it eventually became a museum. It was a great building, but the art collection was rather small. After the museum visit, we walked along the sea to the beach. We don’t travel with beach towels and the beach did not provide any umbrella and seat rental, so we decided to sit on a bench in the shade and watch people. It was kind of fun to watch the crowd. We saw things that you would never want to see.
After our previous experience with buses, we decided to pay little extra and ride the train back to Nice. We never made it to Cannes as we planned, but that was okay, because we really enjoyed Antibes.
-Filip
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Renata
non-member comment
From Prague
Hi guys, I love to read your blog and watch these nice photos. I wish you a great stay in Spain!