Altea Hostel Nice

ok, it was more "collecting a new country" than being really interested in Monaco. Strange, when you go there from Nice airport by bus it costs you 18 € one way, when you go from Nice bus terminal it costs 1 € one way. Monaco is a very clean city. I have never seen so many big and expensive cars. I saw the casino and the castle. Nice, but not spectacular.

I know I always write the same...great weather, such a nice city, good food....but I have to say that Nice was a (very) big surprise for me, I can say that it is my favourite city in Europe (ok, number 2 after Lisbon). You have the mountains, the Cote d´Azur (when you see the water you know why the name is Cote d´Azur), the market with fresh vegetables, fruits, honey, oil, soap, you have great restaurants ...

... gesture. We can't change the world but we can change the way these children start off in life and who knows where that will lead....

It is less than 4 weeks now until I leave. There is much to do. I am trying to prepare myself for "teaching" 20 - 25 children. A bit of a challenge that. Much as I have known that I have always wanted to do something like this, now that it ...

... choice of routes and directions given. A classic is where we are on a main road with a slight bend and there is a goat track leading off the road. She tells us to turn right to avoid the goat track and stay on the highway... Sound advice, I would never have thought...Kim laughs as I often engage in conversation with Mary why she instructed me to go one way but blatantly ignored informing me about an important turn which I only noticed from looking at her screen. Maison d ...

... the french 'boules', which is where lawn bowling originated from. One guy had a very interesting style of chucking his ball up into the air and it would magically land in the right spot and knock out the opponent's ball. We sampled some delicious macaroon dessert thingies, which the new Lindt chocolate store in Chaddy sells and they call them 'delice'. Well, whatever they were, they were awesome, the lady at the store cut up a whole lot and gave us mini taste tests, as there were many ...

... later in comes a French woman, realised her clothes were missing from the machine and someone elses were in- she was off..... I had to do the gesture thing about taking hers out, putting mine in. That was my first experience of being some where where nobody speaks english- a bit unsettling
New language tomorrow- time to bring out the Italian phrase book.

May 26th





Barcelona to Nice. Manage to get some actual sleep on the bus for the first time, maybe traveling on a bus isn't as bad as i had originally thought, Not a lot to say about the countryside etc but very french Riviera, well as i would have imagined it any way. I like the contrast between the terracotta houses the green trees and the blue of the sea ...

... tout de suite le plat principal. Cette partie est vraiment exquise : petits cafés, pubs et restaurants, vendeurs de glaces, poissonniers, boutiques de souvenirs, il y en a pour tous les goûts. Je remarque aussi que la ville est colorée ; des tons de rouge, de jaune et de crème sont dominants, mais aussi toutes les teintes pastel, le blanc et le sable. Mes déambulations, qui durent environ trois quarts d'heure, me mènent au bord de la mer sur le Quai des Etats ...

... in the cement surround the front of the threater was a great photo opportunity. Our lunch for the day was certainly a new expereince, being served escargot and ratatoulli to name a few of the items. From there we again boarded the charter bus with our tour guid to head to the samll republic of Monaco, which we learned has the oldest continuing monarchy to date. We saw the race ...

... charming old town with a nice balance of shops and homes along its crooked stone paths and a unbeatable view of the harbor and Cap Ferrat in the distance. We had the best dinner so far in this area at Les Garcons Restaurant. Planning to catch the 10:35 train back to Nice, we knew something was wrong when it was five minutes late (the trains in France are almost never late) and we took a taxi back instead. A minor glitch on a really nice day.