Beaches, Pastries, & Casinos, Nice & Monaco
Trip Start
Jun 08, 2008
1
56
65
Trip End
Dec 08, 2008
Nice,
Provence,
France
Wednesday, November 5, 2008
I knew that Nice was going to be insanly beautiful but I also knew that it would be even nicer if it was warm. There are a lot of controlables and uncontrolables while traveling. One UNCONTROABLE it THE WEATHER. Not much I could do so I decided to make the best of it. A walk on the boardwalk to watch the waves from the Mediteranan didnīt turn out to be a bad afternoon. The weather broke for a few hours so it gave me a break. I arrived late in the day so there wasnīt that much to do. I found out that my hostel room wasnīt even close to booked, it ended up to be just me. A 6 bed dorm room and I had it all to myself, not bad. I went out for a bite to eat and pretty much called it a night. Until the storm blew in.
I was sitting in my room reading and started to hear the thunder. I thought it might be nice to take a walk, even though it was raining. I sat and watched the lightning light up the entire sky over the Med for about an hour. It was really cool over the water.
The next day I quickly realized that Nice is defianlly a summer town and in the winter people seem to be hiding. The hostel was filling up quickly but with a special group of people. I found out quickly that they were having the Nice Marathon in the city that weekend. The entire room was full of runners from all over Europe. Not one traveler, not one person on vaction, just runners. I took a walk around the city walls in the afternoon, checked out the million dollar yachts and finally was enjoying a pretty nice afternoon. The sun was finally out and was feeling pretty damn good. It ened up to be about 20 degrees in the middle of the afternoon. Went for a bite to eat and headed back to the hostel at about 8:00pm.
I knew that I wasnīt joined by the most exciting group of people in the world seeing when I arrived at 8:00pm they were all in bed, this could mean only one thing, they were going to be up early. I turned right back around, headed to a pub for a few drinks and then headed back to the hostel to crash for myself. YUP, I was right, up early, 4:00am for some and 5:00am for the other. They were really good though but I kinda felt like an idiot when they retunred at 9:00am after their work out I was still in bed. Gotta love it.
That moring I took a day trip into Monaco and to Monte Carlo the famous Casino. It was a full 17 minutes from Nice by train. When I arrived I knew that it was one rich place but I had no idea just how rich. I took the walk to the top of the hill and watched the changing of the gaurds at the Palace. Not nearly as impressive as in London but still worth the walk. I then took the walk down to the city, I wanted to check out this Casino everyone keeps talking about. I quickly found out that the money in the city was insane. There was quick tale signs if you were local or a tourist...
If you were driving a car that wasnīt worth over $80,000, you had rented it and you were a tourist. If you arrived on a boat that wasnīt a yacht and worth over $2,000,000, you arrived on the cruise ship and you were a tourist. If you have problems finding a parking space, you were a tourist only beacuse the only people that have problems finding a parking space is the valet drivers.
Dogs are not pets, they are an accessory for your car. You are not allowed to own a dog over 5 lbs, only because it wonīt fit into your Louie Vuitton bag. The womens are dressed to the nines and the guys love to have them on their arms, no matter what it costs them. My goal when I arrived was throughout my day I was going to try and take at least 10 pictures of Lamborghinis, it took me all of an hour.
Monte Carlo was just a building, I didnīt get inside for a couple of reasons. The cover charge of 20 euros and I really didnīt feel I was dressed for the occation. It was quite impressive from the outsides though and the cars that people were pullin up in were even more impressive. BMWīs and Mercedes are the Honda and Ford of the Monaco World. Bentley, Porche, Ferrari, and Lamborghinis are the car of choice in the city. An eye opener but really cool to watch from the distance.
The next day I was headed to Marseille, BAD MOVE, Either I am getting jaded and spoiled or I have picked a few bad cities latley ..............................
