France

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  Nice, Provence, France
Friday, October 10, 2008

Writing this I am sitting in a cafe overlooking the formula 1 track  and harbour of Monaco.  Yes boys and girls, today is a glorious warm  day in Monaco and I'm sitting in the middle of the formula 1 track  eating my very expensive lunch. After lunch I am going to stroll the  waterfront dreaming of how I can get me one of those nice boats then  catch a bus to Eze, a small village between Monaco and Nice.

This morning I went and watched the changing of the guard at the  palace then took a tour through some of the apartments, saw the throne  room and a family portrait of Prince Rainer III, Grace Kelly and the  kids. Grace Kelly was a beautiful woman. They love her here,  everything is Princess Grace this, Princess Grace that.

Yesterday I was Cannes with my room mates and was disappointed. It's  really not that great. Nice on the other hand is beautiful. The water  front promenade is amazing. Reminds me of Mission Bay and makes me  miss home. It's better here for roller blading, running and cycling as  it is a very wide promenade. Tomorrow afternoon I head to Marseilles  for two nights before heading to Ireland. That reminds me I need to  remind Andrew I'm coming.

Paris was not my favourite place. I felt kind of stressed out there.  It is very busy and fast paced. The nderground was very good. My  first day there I went on a bike tour to Versailles. The tour was  awesome despite the rain and wind. Versailles is huge! It is an amazing  palace.

The next day I walked the Champs Elysees all the way from place de  concord to the arc de triumph, then climbed all 284 stairs to the top.  It was an amazing view. After wards I joined a free walking tour and 
our guide was a kiwi girl from Rotorua. Short to say I was  disappointed in the tour. We only saw the Eiffel tour from a distance.  I was glad I had seen it the night before.

The next day I packed in the last of my must see sights leaving Notre  Dame and St Chapelle for my last morning. That evening I joined a night  bike tour. It was the best thing I did in my whole trip. It is run by  Americans but they are great. There was a couple a bit older than my  parents from Hamilton in the tour and a bunch of Aussies. We all had a  blast. The last part of the tour was a boat trip down the Seine. We  also had some French red wine on the trip. Short to say some people  couldn't ride in a straight line up the small hill from the boat and  the rest of us couldn't ride in a straight line trying to dodge the  others. It was a great laugh. Best tour ever. I would highly recommend  Fat Tire Bike tours to anyone and they're not just in Paris.

My last morning in Paris I did Notre Dame and St Chapelle before  heading to Tours. Tours was a noticeably more relaxed town. Saturday I  went on a tour of four castles in the Loire Valley my favourite being  Chenonceau which is built on a bridge. Then it was a quiet day on  Sunday in Tours. Oh by they way everything closed on Sunday. And I  mean everything except the tourist stuff which is not much in Tours  other than a couple of cathedrals. I went on a petit train around the  city for my main attraction of the day.

8:13am the next morning I was on a train back to Paris to catch a TGV  (super fast train) to Nice. My train had problems so it was a good  30mins late leaving Tours. Thankfully it had scheduled stops on the  way where it had to wait so managed to make up time.

And that has been France so far. Having a good time. Oh I'm sharing a  room with three older i.e. retirement age Brazilian women. I've kinds  been adopted. They are a hard case. I get serenaded to sleep each  night. They always manage to get to sleep before me.

See you all soon. Not long now till I return to reality. Till then  aurevoir.

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