Day 6 25/3/10
Our hostel, Hotel Belle Menieure was the cutest place ever. It's a little house tucked away between two bigger hotels with a pebble courtyard in from and lots of trees, a sitting area and a big iron gate. We stayed on the third floor in a private 4 bed room with a slanted ceiling... very attic -esque.
Day 5 24/3/10
We slept in for the first time which was quite enjoyable, got what became a typical lunch (baguettes and cheese) and had a picnic on the beach. I was expecting the beaches in southern France to be sandy but alas, they are pebbly much like the beach back in Brighton. While picnicking we saw a big waterfall in the distance on the side of a mountain and decided we had to go there. We made our way over and walked to the top of the hill where we got an awesome view of the city.
As we were walking around the top of this hill we saw the port with a bunch of yachts so we ventured down and took some time to fantasize about owning yachts.
There's an elliptical machine on this yacht.
Nice is an amazing city. It has this old part of town with all these narrow streets for pedestrians dotted with shops, bars, restaurants and cafes. We walked through the old town to get back to the hostel, took a nap, freshened up and went out on the town! Our hostel manager, Robert, told us about this drum and base concert at a club in town called Le Volume. The concert was free if you were a member of the club so we paid the 2euro membership fee and went in. Now I'm a member of a club in Nice, France! NICE. Drum and base is really popular in England and it was funny to go to a club in France where they were in the middle of a month-long English music festival. It made me realize how even though every country in Europe is so different, the culture exchange is huge.
Day 7 26/3/10
We woke up with only one thing on our minds: crepes. We went back to the old part of Nice for a crepe lunch, bought some presents and made our way back to the beach to get some sun.
Riley and Greg enjoying the ocean air.
Soap is a big seller in Nice. This stand had a bunch of bath salts and other soapy products.
Once back at the hostel we hung out with Robert, our German hostel manager, his British friend who was in town for a wedding and three Canadians who are on a 2 year trip around the world. We spent the rest of the evening with all the people staying at the hostel. Literally, everyone was in our room hanging out and drinking. There were so many nationalities represented in one room: American, Canadian, Danish, British, German, Estonian, French and Korean. This night was the hostel experience I was hoping we would encounter. Later we decided to venture down to the beach and a few of the boys took a night swim in the freezing cold water. It was so fun just to meet people and be talking and laughing and skipping stones into the Mediterranean.
Day 8 27/3/10
This day brought with it the best weather we'd had so far. We decided to spend the day with the Canadians in Monte Carlo, Monaco so we took a 20 minute train ride to Monte Carlo. Monaco is the second smallest independent state in the world, the other one being Vatican City. It's also the world's most densely populated independent country. The train ride alone would have been enough amazement for the day, it was gorgeous ride with the bluest ocean on one side and huge cliffs on the other.
We spent the day exploring and saw more expensive cars and private banks than I knew existed. After hanging out at the beach for a bit we went to the port and saw the most amazing yachts including the "Lady Moura", the 19th biggest yacht in the world.
After returning to our hostel, napping and unwinding from a mind-blowing day in Monte Carlo, we made our way back to the old part of town to find a hookah bar where we spent our last night drinking delicious tea, smoking hookah and enjoying each other's company.
Nice observations: This place is paradise. There isn't a ton of touristy stuff to do so relaxing is main activity and we did plenty of that. All the homeless people have dogs here which is similar to what I saw when I was in Rennes in high school. They basically whore their dogs out so people will pity them and give them money. So sad. None of the dogs are ever on leashes. New goal: train Joey to be leashless. It might not go so well, but it's possible. Time does not exist when on vacation. Similar to in Barcelona and most other cities in Europe, there is a rent-a-bike program where you can pick up a bike at one location and drop it off somewhere else. There are lots of middle easterners and north africans living in southern France.
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