La Côte d'Azur

Nice and shoreline.

Dallin and I had been thinking about going to Nice, France for a while. The drive is not too long for us (about 4.5 hours) and we really wanted to see the beach. We had a four day weekend coming up so we decided to drive on down to the French Riviera.

We had a splendid time! The Côte d'Azur is nothing short of glamorous. The cities along the coast are so picturesque, the Mediterranean sea is sparkling blue, and its no wonder crowds of the rich and famous flock to this area in search of sun and relaxation.

The drive to Nice was pleasant, dotted with spectacular views of the sea along the way. We stayed at an awesome hostel in Nice. It was nice and clean and very hip :). It was great because the hostel had a chef there who made amazing food and it was really cheap. We ate there a few times. A great way to save money in the otherwise, very expensive French Riviera. After we settled into our room, we of course put on our swimsuits and headed straight for the beach.

The beaches in Nice are mostly pebbly, as you can see, but we managed to find a comfortable spot to lie down and soak up some sun and admire the beautiful Mediterranean Sea.

After taking a little nap on the beach we decided to take a walk through the city of Nice.

I just loved the bright, happy buildings here!

We started by walking down the Promenade des Anglais. This paved sidewalk, named "the walkway of the English" was erected in the 1800s for the rich English tourists who wanted a safe and clean place to walk along the beaches, avoiding the surrounding fishy smelling gravel. The walkway was originally paved with marble, but now it is the perfect path for an afternoon stroll for anyone.

Me on the Promenade des Anglais.

A private beach and restaurant along the Promenade.

At the end of the promenade, a view of the seafront.

After walking along the beaches we headed into the old town of Nice. This area is full of great restaurants and has a lot of character. The city of Nice is reminiscent of the towns in Italy. This is because Nice actually used to be a part of Italy, so there are many pizzerias and gelati stands around here too!

In the heart of Old Nice.

We got some dinner in the old town. I got some yummy seafood pasta and Dal of course, got pizza. We finished off the night with some yummy treats.

I was so excited for crepes! Yummy.

Day 2 started out a bit stressful. We had planned to go to three different cities: Eze le Village, Monaco, and then Cap d'Ail. We planned out our day perfectly by looking at the bus schedule our hostel gave us and deciding which buses we needed to take. However, we didn't know that the bus station was actually under construction, so the bus schedule was completely different. Because of this, we didn't know where to catch our first bus. We were walking all over town, trying to find the bus stop for our bus and trying to translate the French signs and maps. We would have never found the stop, except we saw the bus drive by us. We were sprinting, trying to catch up to the bus and following it to the bus stop. Finally we caught up to the bus and we were able to hop on. So needless to say, we got a later start than we had hoped, and it was pretty frustrating trying to find that bus!

Fortunately our first stop, Eze le Village, was amazing, and made up for the spoiled morning. Eze le Village is this medieval town built on the top of a mountain. It is a very small village and there are no cars or bikes because the streets of the town are not really streets; they are pathways. I'm not sure if anyone actually lives in this town! I know that people used to in the medieval times, but now it looks like there are only shops, restaurants and hotels. Eze le Village was so beautiful and kind of unreal just because the town is literally a small labyrinth of pathways that you can just explore. Normally there are some beautiful views of the Mediterranean from Eze le Village, but unfortunately some dense clouds blocked our view.

Eze le Village

Walking around Eze le Village.

The "streets" of Eze leVillage.

We had planned to only spend an hour in Eze le Village, however, as I said before, the bus schedule we were relying on turned out to be wrong and the bus didn't come for another 2 hours. So we decided to get some lunch. The bus finally came and we were able to move on to the next city, well actually country: Monaco!

If you are ever feeling braggy and rich you should go to Monaco. You will be greatly humbled and will most definitely start to feel poor. I know we did! This little micro-country is filled with glamourous hotels and casinos with scores of beautiful luxury automobiles parked out front. Our first stop in Monaco was the Monte Carlo casino. We knew we wouldn't be cool enough to actually enter the casino, but we just wanted to see it for its fame. We did enter the lobby and snuck a peek of the rich and famous gambling their money.

The front of the Casino Monte Carlo

Ferraris, Bentleys, and Rolls Royces galore!

We continued to walk through Monaco along the harbor admiring the beautiful yachts.

And I raced in the Monaco Grand Prix!

We eventually made our way to the Prince's Palace where the present prince of Monaco, Prince Albert lives. We didn't really get any good pictures of it because it was covered in scaffolding.

The Prince's Palace.

We continued to walk through Monaco-ville to the Cathedral of Monaco. This is where Prince Ranier and Princess Grace Kelly were married and where they are also both buried. There was a wedding going on when we were there so we weren't able to go inside. Talk about fairytale wedding!

Cathedral of Monaco

After seeing Monaco, we were exhausted from so much walking, we knew we weren't going to make it to Cap d'Ail so we decided to get back on the bus to Nice. We had a yummy dinner at our hostel and then got some rest.

On day 3 we decided to take the bus to Cap d'Ail which is where one of the best beaches in the Riviera is. Unfortunately it was pretty cold and cloudy at the beginning of the day, so we weren't able to enjoy this beach that much. I did not dress for the weather, and I was cold so I wrapped myself up in a beach towel. Dallin was making fun of me and saying I looked a gypsy. I probably did, but I didn't care. I was cold!

Beautiful beach at Cap d'Ail

Yup, I'm a gypsy.

After lounging around Cap d'Ail for a bit, we decided to move on to the town of Villefranche, which is just up the coast from Nice.

This was one of my favorite towns we visited. So beautiful, and once again, I just love those orange buildings! They make me start craving a creamsicle. Anyways, we got some lunch here in Villefranche, and then the sun came out so we headed to the beach. The beach at Villefranche was nice because it was actually sand. We lounged for a couple of hours there.

Dally frolicking on the beach.

After relaxing on the beach we headed back to Nice and walked around the old town a bit more.

I'm obsessed with wisteria. I love how it looks and how it smells, and I also love how abundantly it grows in Italy and France.

Place Massena, a very interesting square in between the old town and the main shopping district in Nice.

That night we ate another delicious dinner at our hostel and called it a night. The next day we woke up and packed and then began our journey back home to Vicenza. It was a lovely weekend in Nice. We saw lots of beautiful towns and beaches, ate some great food, and even got a little tan! A real success.