Jenn and I woke up in Nice without a plan (quite unusual for us when visiting a new place) on Thursday. By 10am we were out of the hotel and walking along the waterfront of Nice. Jenn absolutely had to dip her feet in the water, so she did just that; a slightly larger wave than expected caught her by surprise. After the quick dip, we headed to a recommended open-air flower/food market at the edge of Old Nice. We found a small little creperie for a late breakfast so that Jenn could have her requested crepe (special request #1). After enjoying that and trying to figure out what to do, we decided to walk around the tiny streets of Old Nice. We walked at our own pace and enjoyed the window shopping and wonderful little courtyards. I think Jenn was in heaven. She snapped more than a few photos of the picturesque streets.
Old Nice was all that was really recommended to us, so we decided to go to
Monaco for a late lunch (we could do more Nice tomorrow morning since we were sleeping here). While walking around Nice I had noticed that scooters were a very common mode of transportation. We decided that we would rent one ourselves. We found a tourist information office that showed us where we could get one and did just that.
Around 2:30pm we were on our scooter and took the beautiful coastal route to
Monaco (some 20 km). Jenn wanted to stop for some scenic pictures, but I recommended we do it on the way back; I was hungry. We got to
Monaco and parked in the harbor for a typical lunch at a small café. We both had pizzas; which I love in
Europe.
After eating, we decided to head further down the coast to a small town, recommended by my mom, called Menton. Unfortunately, the skies were darkening and just short of 5 km to Menton, I made the decision to head back to Nice. Getting caught in the rain may not be fun. Well, the rains came quick.. and hard. The entire 30+ km back were nothing short of soaking. We got back to our hotel around 6pm drenched. We got out of our soaked clothes and both fell asleep. Jenn was not feeling too good, so at the end of the day, we didn’t get to have our 1 year anniversary dinner (planned in
Antibes). We just slept the night away.
Friday morning we felt better and jumped back on the scooter to ride the coast. We took a different coastal road and snapped pictures along the way. With breathtaking views, it was truly a delight. Having only rented the scooter for 24 hours, we rode back into Nice to return the bike by noon. As we walked back to our hotel, we noticed plenty of cafés serving Moules and had to stop (Jenn’s special request #2). Jenn enjoyed a large bowl of Moules while I downed my usual pizza; all the while people watching on a pedestrian street. Jenn was obsessed with all the guys wearing capri shorts. After lunch we headed back to our hotel to check out and head toward
Cannes.
I decided on taking the coastal road to
Cannes in order to drive through
Antibes. It was a slow drive (the drive to
Monaco is better by the way), but scenic. We finally got to
Cannes around 4pm and again parked in the harbor.
Cannes had a very large exposition going on so tents were up all around the harbor. We walked down the waterfront enjoying the water on one side and all the “chic” shops on the other. We stopped in a small creperie for an afternoon snack. Having had our fill of
Cannes, we made our way back to Auribeau. My parents had arrived and there was an evening planned with almost the entire family in Auribeau.
We checked into our little hotel outside Auribeau, L’Aiglon. Words can’t describe how small our hotel room was. Put it this way, our 2 suitcases were difficult to put in the room. We quickly changed and met my parents at their hotel down the street. Once there we all headed up to Auribeau for the family meal. We ate, drank and hung out all night laughing and looking forward to the wedding tomorrow. It was very late, or early, by the time we got back to our hotel.
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