17th Stop - Nice

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Siena - Florence (Bus) - Genoa - Nice (Train)

4-5 September

After an early start on the bus and a long day travelling the trains up the coast of Italy, Monaco and France we stopped for the night in Nice within the French Riviera. We were only looking for two things really - food and a decent bed - but stumbled on a little more than we expected.

Nice has the faded old world majesty of the French Riviera at 21st century prices! We strolled down the main boulevard towards the “beach” - when you come from Australia, you would hardly call this a beach, more like a bay. On the sections of bay “owned” by resorts you have to pay for a place on the imported beach sand (EU15!), or more if you wanted a deck chair and umbrella (EU35!). Sacrilegious! The rest of the bay has free pebbly beaches and areas of sand netted in with beach volleyball courts.

One of the great things about this city is the food though. After months of European style food (with the odd Asian restaurant at sky-high prices) we were pleasantly surprised by the Asian food emporiums where you could select from freshly cooked Thai, Chinese or Vietnamese dishes, snacks and beer all at a pretty reasonable price. Hooray for prawn and pork rolls and Singha! We weren’t the only Aussies in there getting in our fix of Asian food. Another couple standing next to us in the line heard our accents when ordering and exclaimed “Isn’t this great? Asian food! We’ve been craving it since we left Australia 4 months ago!” as she excitedly pointed at another dish to add to their order.

After our meal we wandered along the promenade by the side of the bay, accompanied by other families and young couples holding hands. Many buskers were vying for our attention but a large group was gathered around a guy playing the piano under a stone archway. He was a brilliant pianist and was probably practicing for an upcoming concert. For both the benefit of his hip pocket and good relations with his neighbours he must have decided to practice while busking on the street - how on earth he got his piano here I had no idea. It was wonderful sitting in the moonlight listening to his performance; the acoustics of the archway projected the sound so it was just like sitting in the Opera House. At the end he made a killing with the small change (the hippy fire twirler was not so lucky tonight with such competition) and began to wheel his piano away (ahh, it has little wheels so he can move it around - I hope he lives on the ground floor!). At least this street concert wasn’t at French Riviera prices!

L

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