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...