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Published: December 19th 2009
Day 14: Wednesday, December 9th, 2009
Nice, France (took bus to
Menton, France)
Today was a free day and we decided that, instead of exploring Nice, we wanted to go explore one of Tour Guide Dave's favorite towns, Menton, which was about 40 minutes away by bus. It was only 1 Euro each way versus the train which was 8 Euro each way and took 30 minutes. We, once again, turned to Luna to show us the way since she done do speak French pretty. At one point, I was reminded of a mother duck and her ducklings because we were all walking, almost single file, behind her and if she swerved left, we swerved left. She could have started running in circles and we would have joined her going "Oh, okay, this is what we're supposed to do."
I'd like to point out a cute quirk that Mana (Japan) has. She speaks English beautifully, but she still likes to simplify it sometimes. She'll just blurt out a word now and then, sometimes it will seem out of nowhere. We'll all be looking at the map and she might just point to a tree and go "tree". There'll be something
about the tree that she likes and wants us to appreciate. So, I am getting pretty use to the One-Word-Tourettes that she has but now and then she'll use her perfect timing to go with it. She demonstrated this that, as we were searching for the bus terminal, a bus would pass by and she'd go "Bus". Made me laugh.
We find the terminal and hop on the bus and begin our 40 (ish) minute commute to Menton. We were following the coast the whole way and the weather was perfect so it was a great drive. We get to Menton and find the tourist office where they hook us up with maps. The guy at the tourist bureau was very nice but for some reason I felt insulted when he looked at me and said "Well, you're from America" and looking at the others "where are you all from?" Not sure how I was screaming American, but I was.
He writes down a suggested walking tour and we head out but soon get distracted by the beach. Instead of having sand, there were pebbles on the beach. I can't imagine it would be comfortable to sunbathe on
but talk about clear water! We take some pictures and I do another P.O.N. and we decide to do some lunch and then shopping/sight seeing. We end up talking/laughing our way thru the streets so we don't get around to having lunch until a couple of hours later. By this time, I no longer trust my stomach, so my new food regime begins: I only eat at night. I had some water as they all enjoyed experiencing new food. Oh well, I'll gladly make the trade off. By the time we're done with our long French style lunch (they take 2 hour lunch breaks) it's getting late so we start wandering to the bus terminal. Along the way, we pass a very interesting Christmas court that has large models of the planets, spaceships, and Santa clinging to a rocket ship for dear life. As we start to walk by the Rocket Ship Santa, I notice that they went into detail sculpting him and Santa has ass crack going on. Crack is whack and Santa crack is double whack. So, being 5 years old, I had to take a picture of it. Then I had to take a picture of my
thumb aimed at the crack. (Speaking of crack, at the beginning of the trip I had Luna convinced for about 30 seconds that Nancy Reagan was the one who coined the term "Crack is Whack" For those of you playing at home, the answer is really Whitney Houston.)
We get on a bus and head back to Nice. We get off a few stops from the hotel and walk along the promenade where we see the War Monument (
Monument aux morts). We meet up with the rest of the group at the hotel and head off to an included dinner. Italian food. Again. I love me some pasta, but wow- we're not even in Italy yet! After dinner, some head back to Wayne's bar but our crew decides to head back to the hotel and play some cards and call it a night.
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Chris
non-member comment
You took blackmail photos of Santa Claus?
It's the South-of-France on-the-Beach diet!! Water and pebbles. Mmm.