Vacanciel L Orangeraie Menton

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 ...

... 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 ...

... 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 ...

... of Prince Albert - no joke), then walked along the harbour. The harbour had a full fairground atmosphere with rides, games, food, lights etc. We had the most delicious kebab for dinner from a stall :-) So posh!

We then followed the curve of the harbour to gape at the boats moored there. The amount of money people obviously have is just obscene!

Next we thought maybe we would have a go at trying to win ...

... and Cannes. Dani was pumped for Cannes as this is where they hold THE Cannes film festival. Unfortunately, just as our luck would have it, the train we took was delayed by almost 2 hours, and we still don't know why. So it took us much longer to get to our first stop on our journey which was Antibes. We had been recommended to have some lunch there and apparently they have an awesome market. However thanks to the aforementioned delay, and our silly Dubcheck moves which will be revealed ...

... went looking for a bus as he'd been looking at that hill and decided it wasn't an option - unfortunately he didn't find one. He did find a sign to the hostel which pointed up a seemingly harmless road so off we went. Scot led the way and marched on ahead...after consulting his map he crossed the road and disappeared out of sight. When the rest of the group arrived at that spot it seemed he disappeared into thin air however on closer inspection it seemed the only way was ...

... loop of the Gran Prix circuit! After about 3 seconds of convincing, Matthew and Emma went to re-park the car while I got some money out of the ATM and signed Matthew up to drive! He was in absolute heaven! The car was spectacular, and he had a blast! After the thrill ride, we went to get our Golf (what a disappointment after driving the Ferrari!) and headed over to the Monte Carlo Casino to look at the fabulous ...

After a good nights sleep we had some breakfast (sourced the night before from the supermarket), and after we were packed we caught a bus to the train station and bought our ticket to go to Menton, and we stored our bags in lockers. We went for a wander around and then made our way to an internet cafe to do some updates to the blog and upload some photo's. After a while we decided to go and find something to eat, and we found a thai restaurant where we could get a meal before our train ...

... comme 3 pigeons dodus. La ville est construite a flanc de montagne et il y a tout plein de petits escalier cachée et tortueux. Les maisons sont toutes biens sculptées ou peinturées. Tres joli. Du haut de la colline ou le palais est, on voit le port de tous les yacth. Yen a des vraiment gros. Une vraie fortune qui flotte la. Je me suis dis que les frais de reconstruction en cas de tsunami seraient plus élévés pour cette baie que pour celui d ...