Cimiez

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Late start, still nice and sunny out. We walked the usual, through the markets on Jean Medecin down to Nice Gare. Sorted out a few tickets for tomorrow & checked where the bus leaves for the airport, seeing as there are building works taking over the road frontage outside the station while they construct 'a big thing' !
Onto Notre Dame area and tried to source some french music CD's that we had made note of earlier. I think the french language is a hard one to sing. But I do think 'ZAZ' (a female singer, Isabelle Geffroy & in particular her songs T'Attends Quoi & On Ira & others......) are very good....a mixture of jazz, french variety, soul & acoustics.
Wandered further down to the Old Town and a stroll through the street of working artists, painters, sculpters, mosaic artists, potters, photographers, soft crafts.
Nice has put alot of finance into their city streets and keep them very clean, however the Old Town has become very neglected and starting to show it's wear and tear. There it does draw enormous crowds of tourists to such small spaces I imagine it is difficult to maintain.
Home for lunch & plan our route to Cimiez not far from here.
Roman ruins quite a long way in from the sea, Matisse Museum, Francescian Church, the Olive Grove (600 yr old trees) come petanque playground, Regina Hotel, Matisse Burial site, public garden & an Archaelogocial Museum.

The area from where we are up to Cimiez became an elite area for property investors in the late 1800's and many elaborate Villas and hotels were built, including the Hotel Regina named after Queen Victoria if she would come and stay there on completion. It would have to meet certain criteria that she expected (sewerage, electricity etc). To meet the expectations of investors, the path drawn in dotted line on the 1875 cadastre, from the avenue Désambrois to the arena of Cimiez is opened and becomes passable in 1881 (hence our difficulty to plan a walk up the hill). Gradually, in less than a decade, agricultural lands disappear in favor of rich homes and luxury hotels. At the end of the century, the entire European aristocracy, enamored of the winter micro-climate, will meet on the Riviera.

During the WWI the hotel was requisitioned and turned it into a military hospital. The stock market crash of 1929 "The Regina", and the four hundred rooms are transformed into ninety-eight apartments. From 1938 to 1943, the painter Henri Matisse lived in the Regina, in a vast apartment - workshop.

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Comments

[John]

:)
LOL...,Poor Brian :)