Hotel Le Ponteil Antibes

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 dŽAzur (when you see the water you know why the name is Cote dŽAzur), the market with fresh vegetables, fruits, honey, oil, soap, you have great restaurants ...

... Not only have the donations received already far exceeded my expectations, but the kind words and general interest and support that I have received have been amazing. So thank you all. It is all very much appreciated and I can't believe that between us we really will change these little lives. It is my motto here in Antibes, but this is the ultimate "think globally; act locally ...

Keeping Clean... the shower offensive Scooby is only the size of a delivery van... 4.8m Long and 2.3m Wide... fits snuggly into a shopping car park space. Height is not an issue as he is 2.6m tall so plenty of room for us shorties! The point is that space on the inside is at a premium, so the shower is "cosy"... but it does the job. Best of all we have a gas water boiler so the water is HOT HOT HOT!! We need to fill up our water tank every few days as there is only enough ...

... we eventually found a cute place that by some miracle was open. Emboldened by some food, we found our way back to the station and decided to proceed on to the next stop, Cannes. It was a little disappointing, as it seems that it is quite a small town area and we can't quite work out why they would hold a huge film festival there, but anywho. Dee kept on the lookout for Brad Pitt or George C, but no luck unfortunately as the festival was much earlier in the year. We saw some locals ...

Antibes the Beach-Our first day in Antibes and we need a rest so the beach sounded like the place to be. We relaxed on the fine sand, but the water was a bit cool for a full on swim and being the Mediterranean there were no waves. But there was a steady flow of little jellyfish that people would scoop from the sea and throw into the trash, the girls even got in on the jellyfish scooping action. Many tan ...

... chose a girl who I worked with all day and also spoke French well.

The next day, I arrived at 9 and got straight to work. We had to rearrange all of the table again and we wouldn't stop adding and subtracting places from the tables until well into dinner, hours later. My boss had other things to attend to, so I was again put in charge of the entire tent, volunteers and workers. Since the decorations were donated by Donatella Versace, her creative ...

... water is South, not West. Ross brought me a new iPod, which is technically from my dad, and I love it! It's a really pretty blue and it holds a bunch of music. Thanks dad! I bring it along running with me because Ross bought me an arm band that holds the iPod while you are running. Today I listened to the Beatles and it started raining on my way back. I have school Monday through Thursday, three hours a day. Today my first project was due and it was a poster. I ...

... walked up to enjoy what Queen Victoria once enjoyed (though damned if we know how they got her up there). She apparently dabbled in watercolours and painted one of her pictures from the square on the edge of the town. Very touristy now, but you can see why. It is in a fantastic location which since ancient times has been a place of refuge and defence. A perfect example of a feudal village. Onward towards Vence was the town of Tourrettes-sur-Loup, perched ...

... around Cap Antibes. Didn't look too far on the map........ Well it was much further than we thought, and with a toilette stop being required along the way (we now have a hedge we term piddle point near to Cap Antibes), the walk all up was just over 12km took nearly 3œ hours (there was a lot of window shopping and supermarket browsing in Juan le Pins) and even then we missed part of it. Of course we have since gone back and covered the missing parts ...