French Riviera Photos

Euro Trip: Leg 4 - Nice, Eze, Monaco and Villefranche

On to Nice.

So if you read my previous post, I obviously was ready to get out of Paris (oddly enough) and make it to Nice. Yes, after suffering the cold, the French Riviera sounded like a nice change of scenery. Not to mention, Mack had mentioned to me that Johnny Depp lived near Nice. Who knows, maybe he still had some candy from doing Willy Wonka! One could only hope.

After trekking up a gigantic hill past countless presents dogs left behind for us to dodge (seriously Europe, get your act together, pick up after your dogs), we made it to our hostel. Right away we were pleasantly surprised. After such a disappointing hostel in Paris, anything would have been an improvement, but this was so much more. The meeting area was in an old cathedral with stained glass walls and vaulted ceilings. The rooms were great. The beds were like a dream. The bathrooms were large and clean. They served great food right in the hostel for cheap. One of the staff even offered us a cookie from the package he had just received from his mom! We were in utter disbelief.

Dropping off our bags, we headed back down to Nice where we explored the beach and the old town for a little bit. The beach wasn’t what I was expecting. For some reason, I think all beaches are white sand. This had a grey pebble and probably was not too comfortable to lie out on, but it was beautiful none the less. The old part of town was really cute. The architecture and the city as a whole definitely felt much more Mediterranean than French.

We ate in the hostel that night. The food was delicious and the people were great. We ended up playing Asshole with some other Americans, a guy from New Zealand, a Norwegian couple and maybe a few other nationalities mixed in. It was great mixing with so many cultures in such a relaxed environment.

The next day we headed off to Eze. Well, we attempted to head off to Eze. Our ignorance of the bus schedule made it so that we missed our bus by about 5 minutes and the next one was in over an hour. Opting not to wait, we skipped Eze and headed to Monaco, thinking we could hit up Eze on the way back. The ride was beautiful. It was right along the seaside up in the hills and afforded so many great views of the small towns dotting the coast line. On the trip, a fellow traveler and American, Ross, must have heard our own American accents and asked where we were from. We started chatting a little bit, exchanging small snippets of our own trips and eventually decided to see Monaco together. We went to the changing of the guards at the country’s palace. It was decidedly less impressive than the British version, but still interesting to see. Then we went down to the docks. I must admit, this was the major draw for me anyways. To see such opulent yachts docked was enough, but having the owners Ferrari parked outside was just too much. Ross and I drooled over these Italian pieces of art, admiring their engines and perfect styling. On our way out of Monaco we stopped by the casino, an inspiration for many Bond movies. We later heard from our Norwegian acquaintances that the inside was even more remarkable, with great works of art hanging everywhere and just supreme architecture.

While we dawdled by the casino, our bus to Eze made its way out of Monaco. We missed it by like 3 minutes this time! Well, we weren’t going to wait two hours, so we went back to Nice. Once back in Nice, I explored the old city and the Chateaux (I think it was called) which is this great hill overlooking the city, the beach and the port.

The next day we were determined to get to Eze. We made sure we made it to the bus station on time and were off to the small medieval city (well, town) situated on the top of a hill overlooking the sea. We lost ourselves in the narrow, winding stone streets and eventually made it to the top of the town. There was an exotic garden at the top. Apparently exotic means cactus in French. There were agave and prickly pear and aloe and so many other cacti surrounding us as we had amazing views of the surrounding shorelines.

Back in Nice we visited the modern art museum (which is always free by the way, along with apparently most of the museums in Nice) and retreated to the hostel to spend one last night relaxing.

The next day our flight was in the afternoon, so Mack and I split up for a few hours to see what intrigued us. I went to Villefranche, this small fishing village about 10 minutes outside of Nice. I just walked around and read on the beach while small sailboats and dingy bobbed in the water in front of this brightly colored coastline.

Nice was probably one of my favorite stops on the trip, which was entirely surprising. I think the fact that I didn’t have a list of required sites to visit in a short amount of time helped. Also, following Paris, I needed a place to relax and get over my cold (which I did!) to prepare for Rome. Also, they did our laundry for 5 euro! After a week and a half of the same few shirts and pants, access to laundry is like a godsend.

Well, this is the second to last leg of my Euro Trip, with only Rome remaining, but as I am just hours away from departing for my Spain and Italy trip, I must start packing and organizing! Oh, it feels good to finish exams and jet off to the south of Spain. I could definitely get used to this. One looming disappointment though, I may not be able to watch the Packers play in the Superbowl. Apparently Venice is not a popular destination to watch the game, who knew. I think I will find some way to survive though, perhaps drowning myself in pasta and gelato.

Paris Photos

Euro Trip: Leg 3 - Paris

So it has become apparent to me in the past few days that, if you want me to update my blog, just give me something that I really am supposed to be doing, take studying for my Fluid Mechanics final, for example, and I will do almost anything else to avoid it, including watching all three El Señor de los anillos (The Lord of the Rings), doing my laundry, keeping up with the world news (Egypt is a mess) or even writing entries for my blog.

A quick aside:

Usually, when character names are changed when a movie or book or whatever is translated into another language, I tend to get annoyed. This wasn’t completely the case for The Lord of the Rings. They cleverly changed Tree Beard to Barbol (I am assuming a combo of barba meaning beard and arbol meaning tree), but why on (Middle) earth change Baggins to Bolson? You cannot change the main characters name. That would be like changing Harry Potter to Harry Ceramista. You just don’t.

My account of my European trip continues with Paris. If I don’t update this quickly I am going to forget what even happened! Or at least everything will start to blend together, especially with more trips coming up!

Anyways.

Paris.

I would have to say, I was really looking forward to Paris. The Eiffel Tower, Arch du Triomphe, Louvre, Musee d’Orsay, Palace of Versailles, Champs Elysees, Notre Dame. The list goes on. So many monuments, so many impressive sites that I learned about in history classes, literature classes, through Disney movies. So many baguettes! I built Paris into this lofty, ideal city in my head. My great expectations might have had something to do with my disappointment with the city. This isn’t to say that I disliked Paris by any means, and to be fair, I intend to go back to see if it was just the circumstances that left me wanting more, but honestly, I was hoping for more.

Let’s get the bad out of the way first so we can end out on a good note?

The disappointment probably started with the hostel. It was dirty. The staff was not helpful. It was not set up to be conducive to meeting people. Probably my least favorite hostel. Even the kitchen was bad. A fridge, a microwave and a sink do not a kitchen make. Not to mention, when we got there, Mack had no bed in the room she was assigned to and on the last night of our stay they stormed into her room at 1:30 in the morning, yelling at her (apparently), telling her she was in the wrong room, that she had made a mistake that made everyone upset. From what I could tell, this was by no means her fault, yet they made her feel awful. Fair warning to everyone, although Jules Ferry Youth Hostel may be a cheap option, spend the extra money for a nicer place. Staying there could ruin your trip.

The next damper on our Paris trip: the weather. It was overcast, cloudy, or rainy every day in Paris. Also, after spending the winter in Spain where the temperature hovered around 50 degrees, the 30 degree weather felt COLD. Usually this isn’t too bad. Belgium and Switzerland were cold, but I liked my stays there. It was raining in Seville and Madrid, but I Seville was one of my favorite cities in Spain. But after a week of already travelling in hostels with crappy breakfasts, long train rides and always being on the go so you can fit in all the sites, your body is worn down. This chilly weather was apparently just too much for me. By the end of our stay in Paris, I was huddled under my blankets in the very cold hostel room, shivering, trying to sleep despite my coughing, my stuffy nose, and having the chills. Also, since the weather was so wet, that meant fog. Every day. Fog meant I never saw the top of the Eiffel Tower, and wasn’t motivated to even go up it because I knew the view would not be worth it.

Finally, the holidays in Paris made it worse. I know, I know. I was psyched to spend my New Years in Paris, and it was fine. Don’t get me wrong, I enjoyed my night popping champagne bottles while people around me lit fireworks and the Eiffel Tower shimmered. Yet, the holidays made things very inconvenient for us. Most of the monuments were closed on New Years and had shorter hours on New Year’s Eve, meaning we had to fit everything in on a tighter schedule than our already tight schedule. Also, we were not the only tourists who thought about spending their New Year’s in Paris. There were tourists everywhere. Now, I assume that, yes, this is Paris and yes, there are always tourists everywhere, but I don’t want to stand in line for 2 hours to go up into the Eiffel Tower, especially when the weather was like it was.

So despite the hostel, the weather, and the tourists, (and admittedly, the high costs) I enjoyed my stint in Paris. The first night we walked up Champs Elysees. I saw the Arch, the tower, Notre Dame, the Louvre, the obelisk, everything I was looking forward to. The next day we visited the Palace of Versailles. The Hall of Mirrors was finished (apparently it was being renovated for a while), and the gardens looked spectacular, despite it being winter (when I do go back to Paris, I want to revisit the gardens in better weather). I then made it back to inside the city to see the Louvre and the Musee d’Orsay.

I can hardly wrap my head around the fact that Paris has two of the most impressive collections of art in the world, and they are essentially across the street (and river) from each other. Of course, after seeing the Venus de Milo and the Mona Lisa (the crowd around this painting was more impressive that the small artwork itself) I was pretty much done with the Louvre. I was tired. I was hungry. I was lost. Yes, it took me 30 minutes to exit the Louvre. Talk about a labyrinth. I enjoyed the Orsay more. The collection of impressionism was pretty astounding. The Cezannes, Monets, Manets, Van Goghs. So many of my favorites gathered within one building.

The next day (New Years Day), as everything was closed, we headed to the Pere Lachaise cemetery (of Paris, Je T’aime fame). It was pretty relaxing, allowing me to contemplate a little among these beautiful mausoleums and tombstones. Not to mention we got to see the burial sites of Oscar Wilde and Chopin.

I tried going back to the Eiffel tower and the Arch, intending to go up one of them. But, as I said before, the crowds and the weather just made me appreciate the structures from the ground. Well, off to Nice.