sunshine on the Cote d'Azur

After logging in just about 30 000 steps yesterday (by my watch), Snowdrop slept like a log again. Me, I was a bit off with my sleep total and I put the blame for that entirely on the next Maeve Binchy novel that (Evening Class). It has to be about the tenth of hers that I'm binge reading this winter (into spring!) and I should have known better than to get into her stuff on a trip. Her books are grand from beginning to end, but they especially pull you in when you start nearing the final quarter. You can't put it down and inevitably your light stays on too late. 

But what a morning to wake up to! 

As promised, there's plenty of sunshine and the Mediterranean colors start to really come through. Azure coast indeed!

I finally drag the girl out of bed in time for a 9:30 breakfast. Sumptuous once again! Too many thing she loves. Too many things I want to try!

Where to today? I'm thinking the old town, followed by a climb up Castle Hill. It juts out at the eastern edge of Nice and it isn't much of a climb, considering that the Alps spill right to the north of us here with their awesome peaks, nor does it have a castle at the summit. It's long gone, though you can imagine its significance in the days where watching for the enemy was a priority.

We walk along the water's edge again.

Despite its location, Nice doesn't really get the heat you'd expect from a southern place. The average high on this day here is 60F/15C, and we surpass that today by a little. The next two days we'll go higher, but that will be an aberration. So, a pleasant walk it is indeed. Lucky us!

The old town is never going to be an attraction in itself for a child, even one of Snowdrop's travel stamina and tolerance, but since we have a destination in mind, she is both enthusiastic and patient with me as I pause in an artisanal jam shop, and take a bit longer climbing up stairs. To give us energy, we pick up ice cream on the way. Mine is a raspberry chocolate combo that is just superb. She is all about chocolate. 

Snowdrop is in a chatty mood and I listen to her descriptions of kid dynamics in her school. Interesting how much these things do not change from one generation to the next, though the degree of kid self awareness these days is so much higher. Or maybe it's just her? She most certainly understands growth and changes. Often she reflects back, say to second grade, and she'll say -- "I wasn't very smart about these things then; I'm still sometimes not very smart..." Ha! You're a heck of a lot "smarter about these things" than I was in 5th grade!

The views down to Nice are fabulous.

Oh, the colors of the city! The roofs, the sea, the trees of Provence -- all of it.

At the top, it's not crowded at all. March is a wonderful month for travel here. No one is on spring break except some of the American schools. It's nearly empty. And yet so very beautiful, with the perfumes of spring.

There are two guys there up here with their trained pigeons. Snowdrop begs to get one to perch on her hand. I weigh the possibility of animal mistreatment here -- it's low. Fine, go for it!

And she loves it! The thrill of the day for her!

We walk down. She is jubilant, matching the mood of this beautiful day.

It's after 1, and I start to thin about lunch. She's game for another crepe. We're back at the ice cream shop where they also happen to make fresh crepes.

(men with their ice cream: people who live in the south are always overdressed on a warm spring day...)

 

 

Snowdrop had asked to visit a toy store -- she loves to have a few small characters for her imaginative play in the hotel room and I'd forgotten to brings some for her. We cut across the square to the commercial heart of Nice.

 

 

 

We find a toy store at Nicetoile (a shopping mall, of all things), she picks up some Calico critters. I vote for dogs. Fine with her. She gets a family of small pooches. We pass so many interesting little shops here. I stop at a tea shop and pick up some herbal tea -- strawberry and rhubarb. And everywhere we go, we admire Nice's beautiful dogs.

 

 

 

TIme to head back to the hotel. She tells me she needs a toilette. I tell her -- you'll have to put up with a cafe pause, and me ordering a coffee. She is so agreeable.  And I understand why -- gaga, may I please get an order of french fries? I haven't had any yet.

The waitress smiles as she studies her Calico critters. Where did you get those? So cute!  And then, feeling rather friendly -- would you like a photo of the two of you? Yes! 

 

 

 

We walk home in total contentment. Time for a late afternoon rest. But not for long! Gaga, can we go down to the sea?

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

And dinner? I pick Italian for tonight, because really, you have to acknowledge the Italian influence here. So it's La Terre del Sud for us, where we speak a mix of French, Italian, and English, all in one sentence.

 We order three dishes: raw artichoke and arugula salad with slivers of Grana (she eats the Grana!), then a grilled sea bream with potatoes for her and a linguini with seafood for me. I loved the raw artichokes. I though her fish was superb. I thought my pasta dish was very meh. Don't order it if you go there!

 

 

 

 

 

With yet a second ice cream cone (for her!) on our walk home, and some fruit once in our room, we call it a day. Oh such a beautiful, sunny day!

with so much love... 

a new day

It's incredible what a good, no, great night's sleep will do to you! Snowdrop woke up refreshed and ready for anything. I woke up relieved and relaxed. Must be the sea air!

As predicted, it is drizzly out there. We could not care less! Everything is grand.

Including breakfast. A buffet with nothing but good choices. Snowdrop loves the madelines...

 

... and the eggs, the croissant, the potato pancakes, the oranges, the hot chocolate. All of it. 

I'm happy with my fruits, yogurts, pain au chocolat, cappuccino. (She stole my eggs -- I would have been happy with those as well.)

In the moments of waiting in between one thing and the next, the girl makes videos on my phone. Titled photo montages of our dogs, put to music. In searching for appropriate songs for each pup, she says with surprise -- gaga, did you know there's a song called Sexy Sadie? Don't I know it! A Beatles classic from 1968. I thought of it the minute I first learned Sadey's name. Of course I avoided that descriptor like anything! Not something you want to flaunt with the grandkids, especially the young ones. I could see Sandpiper telling his classmates that his grandmother had a sexy sadie at her house.

Still, as you listen to the words now, and look at Sadey's poor guilt ridden face, you have to feel a tinge of wistful sadness. This dog who, at a young age, has carried litters of puppies, born not out of love but of a male dog's sex drive, then proceeds to mess up her life, out of a need to protect herself and the life that suddenly became so good... Here, remind yourself of the words...

Sexy Sadie, what have you done?
You made a fool of everyone
You made a fool of everyone
Sexy Sadie, what have you done?

Sexy Sadie, you broke the rules
You laid it down for all to see
You laid it down for all to see
Sexy Sadie, you broke the rules

...

Just a smile would lighten everything
Sexy Sadie, you're the latest of them all

We gave her everything we owned just to sit at her table
Just a smile would lighten everything
Sexy Sadie, she's the latest and the greatest of them all

 

 

In our room again, we go through the possibilities for the day. Snowdrop doesn't mind the rain. She'd like to start with the market. It's a 20 minute stroll from our hotel along this most lovely seaside promenade.

 

 

Nice's market is compact and wonderful. In the summer it draws crowds of tourists -- never a good thing for vendors who prefer locals who actually will buy a kilo of produce rather than a few pieces of fruit to snack on. Now, on a rainy Sunday, you do in fact see more buyers than just window shoppers like us.  What I loved? The produce of course. Fruits, in season now in southern France, Spain and Italy. Flowers. And veggies -- local carrots that make your eyes blaze and everywhere that Nicois specialty -- the zucchini flower.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 (oranges and lemons from Menton -- up the coast about 30 miles from Nice)

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

We actually do buy something -- nougat candies, which she loves, and a basket of strawberries. French. And so very tasty (she ate every last one in the hotel room).

 

 

Since we are so close to the old port, I suggest we walk there to take a look.

 

(past this sign...)

 

 

 

 

(the old port)

 

 

 

 

(only mildly interested in the port -- she prefers the sweeping coastal views; Nice chairs remind me of UW Memorial Union chairs)

 

(she never passes up a merry-go-round ride)

 

(what's blooming in Nice...)

 

 

 

 

And now Snowdrop is ready for her ice cream -- her favorite, found in Paris, but now also in Chicago. We saw the shop yesterday and think we remember where it is. Turns out we're wrong. Google directs us to its old location (now closed), so we are wrong again. Finally, after going around in wet circles, we track it down. What a total delight for her, to eat this for lunch! (I settle for a coffee and and an ice cream macaron...)

 

 

We're kind of in a hurry now. It's 1:15 and I promised her that this bad weather day gives us a perfect opportunity to try out the hotel pool. It's not much of one -- more like an oversized bathtub -- and they limit kid access to morning hours and then from noon to 2. We sprint and make it in time for her to get a good half hour in.

 

 

Walking, sprinting, swimming (her, not me!) -- we're ready for some downtime. She FaceTimes with her friend, I read and write.  But by late afternoon, I feel we should eat something that some might call lunch. True, we had a big breakfast. Brunch-like in quality and quantity. Still, it was seven hours ago. I propose crepes. It seems filling enough to tide us for a couple of hours, yet not so filling that we could not eat a full dinner at 7.

 

I find L'Oiseau -- just 6 minutes from us. A small creperie, run by Corsicans, with Corsican products. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

It's an important element in Nicois culture. Corsica is an 8 hour ferry ride from Nice (350 kms south-east) and some would say that it properly should be Italian since the island is only 8 miles by water (less than an hour by ferry) from the coast of Sardinia -- a fully Italian territory. But in fact, Corsicans (or Corses in French) have traveled in great numbers to France and especially to Nice over hundreds of years, so their presence here is notable, even as the island itself bears the influence of Italy and the Corsican culture reflects the Italian rather than French temperament and preferences (pizza and gelato everywhere!). Nice has picked up some of that, though here it's hard to say from which side the Italian influence has seeped in, since the Italian border is only 20 miles away by car or train. 

 

(Nutella for her, apple and cinnamon for me. I know, I know -- all sweet. We're on vacation!)

 

 

I'm actually surprised how few tourists we see. Maybe it's the weather and they're all hiding. But even in eateries, we hear French almost exclusively. 

 

 

 

We then walk over to the Russian Orthodox St. Nicholas Cathedral -- the one I wrote about yesterday. Yes, the one that is legally Russian, on Russian territory, a fact that does give you pause. But in fact, the Russian community here remains sizable. We pass a Russian grocery store. We hear Russian as we approach the church. And we are going for its historic and artistic value. I last visited Russia when it was completely under Putin's thumb. St Petersburg was not his though, and neither is this cathedral.

 

 

 

 

 

 

(she meets and greets a cat, while the Russian men engage in an animated conversation, none of which I could hear -- maybe fortunately)

 

A very brief rest follows, and then for the third time today, we set out -- to eat dinner at Chez Davia. The upside? Undoubtedly its food. We start off with beans in a light tempura for her and young artichokes in a clam broth for me (though she snatched one of mine). Finished in a matter of minutes!

 

 

I suggested sole meuniere for her second course -- a pricey dish usually, but almost reasonable here. I settled for the omelette with wild asparagus. Both incredibly good (though she said that in general, she preferred sea bass, which is a heck of a lot less expensive and a more common choice here).

 

The downside? I suppose the restaurant's popularity: one of those places that is packed and everyone sits intimately close to everyone else. 

 

We skipped dessert there. She picked up an ice cream cone on the way home. I have plenty of hotel chocolates to keep me happy!

 

 

Such s full and wonderful day! Such a fun and wonderful travel companion!

 

with so much love... 

 

 

the trip

So where to on this trip? My enthusiastic travel companion Snowdrop voted for Nice (I had stipulated that it had to be in the southern half of the continent).

It's a good choice for us. There is enough in the city to keep things interesting, but because of the sea, and the hills plunging to it, there is a feeling of openness and of nature. Museums and hikes, all in one place. With lots of seafood to please the pescatarian among us. 

Nice had once been a real favorite destination for me. Until it wasn't. What changed? Well, I I had liked it enough to bring Ed to it, and though he wasn't saying it with words, I knew he was just "tagging along" rather than diving into it with anything resembling spirit or enthusiasm. And when I returned alone, years later, I was discouraged rather than enthralled -- this isn't a place for a solo trip anymore. I felt lonely. The city suddenly just seemed like a set of blocks, ones that had held magic before, but held nothing of the sort now. Funny how much a place is grand for you if you see it at the right time and under favorable circumstances. I thought I'd never come back. 

But along comes my younger traveling companion, with her sparkle and enthusiasm and I'm happy as anything to be returning to Nice once again.

The flights? The first one, to Detroit, is a charm. No TSA lines, no delays. Next, to Paris: good winds, timely arrival. Long walk to the next terminal, but we dont mind. Snowdrop tells me it already feels very French. And no lines at passport control! (If you are traveling to France after April 9th -- the day of the great passport control transformation, watch out!)

A pause for breakfast...

And onto our short flight to Nice. Delayed, but who cares -- it's our last one for the day.

Snowdrop benefits greatly from the fact that I am in my last years of travel. I'm making these trips as comfortable for me as possible. I'm old! She gets the spillover effect. It took ten years to climb my way up in the Air France hierarchy and the irony is that now that I'm here, I have it for life, even as most of the travel is behind me. I think the marketing team got that one right!

She gets the spillover effect in terms of hotels as well. I am almost certain that this is my last trip to Nice. In the past, I always stayed at the small hotels on side streets, in rooms with thin walls and varying degrees of warmth in the winter and coolness on a hot summer day. I always wanted to try one of the grand dames along the Promenade des Anglais -- hotels that have been around for years. The Negresco, my choice for this trip, was opened for business in 1913 (the Romanian behind the establishment named it after himself -- he was Henri Negrescu).  It's twice the size of my little Baume in Paris, but that still means it's not one of those huge establishments where you feel completely lost. It is ornate -- something that I find historically interesting and Snowdrop finds beautiful. 

You have to know a bit about Nice at the turn of the century (19th to 20th) to understand the city's significance to the travel industry. In 1864, rail service linking Nice with Russia created an opportunity for the nobility of that country to come to Nice -- for the weather, for the beauty of the place. Tsar Nicholas was the first royal to do this trip. He started a trend. By the beginning of the twentieth century, the Russian community here was quite large. Tsar Nicholas II funded the construction of a Russian Orthodox church here (it's on our list of "things to visit"), which was completed in 1912. You know what happened next! In 1917, the Communists seized control of Russia, tsars became a thing of the past. The question remained -- whose was this church anyway? Here's a surprise -- after years of battling it through the legal system, the French court ruled in 2010 that the church properly belonged to the Russian Federation. A slice of land in Nice, belonging to the Russians. Hmmm....

Nice itself has a complicated history, way too bouncy to explain here. But you have to remember that it wasn't always linked to France. At times it was a part of the Dominion of Savoy, in other years -- part of what was to be called Italy. Nice was a strategic port -- everyone wanted a slice of the pie here. It finally was annexed to France in 1860.

And it wasn't only the Russian nobility who vacationed here. The English royalty has been coming over for a lengthy refresh for a long time. No wonder that they named the seaside boulevard La Promenade des Anglais. 

So, lots of wealthy northerners coming here to Nice for long periods of time in the sun. It's funny that on past visits, I nearly always had period of rain. My bad luck I suppose. On this trip, too, it's cloudy now and we expect rain -- tomorrow. But not thereafter! 

 (from hotel room, she looks out at the sea and spins stories about sailors)

 

 

(the even better view is toward the center of the city...) 

 

 

(someone spotted the chocolate lollipops!)

 

Today is a day of taking it all in, just at the edges. We're tired, it's late. But a short walk is certainly needed! She tugs me toward the beach.

Such small things bring her such great pleasure. Catching waves with her toes, throwing fistfuls of pebbles into the water... 

But, Snowdrop is also very hungry. She had a few mini croissants at the Paris airport, nothing more. It's nearing five when we reach the more commercial streets of Nice. And the Square -- Place Massena, in Nice's colors of orange, gold and sage green.

We stroll peering into bakeries, cafes, food shops. She settles on Mama Roma. Slices of pizza reheated in the oven. True, dinner is in two hours, but I can't have her continue on so little food. She must have been starving because she deemed the pizza "really really good!" I had a coffee with the cannoli. Too sweet, but then, aren't most cannoli too sweet? 

We walk along this busy street and admire the dogs out for an evening stroll with their Nicois. So many doodles here too! 

 

 

 

Well, so many dogs, period. Or, is it that we are both so focused on dogs...

(there's one underneath his chair)

She wants to stop at Petit Bateau -- a clothing store of choice for getting something special for those occasions that call for clothing that go beyond her ratty (according to us) oversized t-shirts. Weird to be shopping for the kids this early in our trip, but on the other hand, it's easier here than in Paris, where the walks from store to hotel are longer and panic sets in as the departure date draws near and I still haven't figured out who'd like what.

We spend a very pleasant hour here. Yes, hour. For a kid that doesn't especially like wearing most clothes grownups choose for her, she sure loves admiring them in this store.  Three hours into being in Nice and our shopping for the kids is done!

 

(walking home at sunset: no Daylight Savings Time here yet!) 

 

Dinner is at the hotel's brasserie (called La Rotonde, because, well, the room is round).  The food is good, and importantly -- requires no effort. We keep it simple: she orders the sea bass, I order the scallops with a salad. And ever the hopeful one in the nonalcoholic wine department, I order a glass of their white NA wine, which of course is terribly disappointing. Stick with the NA beer next time. 

 

 

There are chocolates in our room -- the perfect dessert, though perhaps tonight they disappeared too quickly. We are both so tired, but tired is different than sleepy. I plod on with my stuff, she reads or listens or watches something from her supply of travel material. 

Such a good first day! I wish we would not be starting our explorations in the rain tomorrow, though maybe its good to get the wetness out of the way? We'll set the agenda tomorrow. In the meantime, bonne nuit from Nice!

with so much love...