Novotel Nice Arenas-Aeroport

After brekkie it was onto Menton which is a lovely little town just before the Italian border. Menton is a much more down to earth place than its neighbours and more our scene. We found a park right on the beach and went for a wander and took in sum much needed sun. Next stop Italia!!<br>

Up early as it was a spectacular sunrise - full of pinks and organges. We wanted to hit McWifi before we entered Italy but we did not find one until later in the day in Menton. Before that we drove the coast road through Nice and Monte Carlo, both concrete ...

Gorgeous morning and a stunning place for breakfast awaited us just outside Scooby overlooking the lake. I went for a run but Kim was feeling a little under the weather so she stayed and made me breakfast - yay! We spotted two girls about our age and attempted to engage in some conversation but their English was limited and French is rubbish. Shame as its manily been the grey hair brigade we ...

... Sailboats were docked at the marina (knez, it made me think of you). Diane ordered mussles and Jon and I had our first mussels ever. They were delicious. Thank you Diane for helping me discover my love for sea food. St-Tropez was further than we thought, but thank god we ...

... br><br>Today's Royal itinerary takes us on a tour of Monaco, including old Monaco and the Royal Palace. It's uncertain whether the schedules of Prince Albert or Princess Caroline will allow for a meeting with Princess Lesia but our respective public relations staff are working on it!<br><br>The tour of Monaco-Ville, also known as Old Monaco included a walk through the narrow streets that once ...

... bottles of wine between the 6 of us. It was good to enjoy a nice pasta dish and a HUGE salad. God, i missed that and then, a cheap 2 euro bottle of french wine.. Woo!<br><br>One thing I did want to see and I ended up checking out on day two was the Castle up the hill. You could get a good sense of the view in Nice. It was amazing. From there, I checked out Monaco on day two. Now, Monaco is all about balls and shot callers. Like seriously. Who has a maserati and Ferrari ...

... beautiful. I saw a cartoon when I was younger explaining that unicorns put in the water made it sparkle, and I couldn't help but keep thinking there's got to be a lot of unicorns here.<br><br>Thursday I got up and walked around Nice. I walked past the bus station and saw a bus heading to Monaco and thought, 'what the hell, Monaco sounds good.' and jumped on the bus. I went to the casino, the grocery store, the Monaco church, the palace ...

... only half our cheese at that! Crazy! But we made some delicious pasta with Alfredo sauce, broccoli, and threw in a little pesto for good measure. Sooooooooooo Goooooooooooood!!! The people here were so fun, and all very different. Some change of plans... we couldn't get a train to Barcelona when we wanted... and we couldn't get a train to Paris to get back to Ireland in the time we needed ...

... take-on France. Now, granted, these were all honest mistakes, but funny nonetheless. First, let's set the scene. Late night, south of France. Only Americans at a sidewalk cafe. French all around... So we get some water and Cal the ibanker pours it into the glasses... Frenchie the busboy walks by and extremely nonchalantly (and haughtily) whispers to me - "those are the wine glasses." Haha, ok. So then he pours out balsamic vinegar for our bread instead of oil, oops again ...

... to Grasse, home of many parfumeries (aka, places that make perfume, duh!). We bought some cool soap. The town is very beautiful, with amazing views of the area. We then made our way back down the mountain, towards St. Raphael. Each day we do a high/low of our day, and it was unanimous that St. Raphael is definitely the most beautiful town along the Cote D'Azur. There is a beautiful cathedral, among ...