Around la Cote D’Azur

Published on April 18, 2005 in Travel. 13 Comments Tags: , , , .

Since our last post we’ve been around the Cote D’Azur from St. Tropez in the west to Monaco in the east. It’s all been beautiful.

We spent our first day here getting our bearings in Nice before climbing the Colline du Chateau on the eastern side of the town. The hill used to have a fort on it that was home to the Dukes of Savoy but Louis XIV invaded around 1706 and had the fort destroyed. Now there are just great views, to the west across the Baie de Anges and the main city of Nice and to the east in to the port of Nice and Cap Ferrat.

To the west:chateaulookingwest To the east:chateaulookingeast There isn’t much of the fort and it’s chateau left, the hilltop is now covered in gardens and these neat mosaics dedicated to Ulysses who legend has it stopped here on his way back to Greece after his voyages.ruinsofnicechateauulyssesnice Of course we didn’t spend long looking at the mosaics as I needed to get closer to the boats.portonice There are several hundred more boat photos from the harbour in Nice but there are lots more to come as we travel around the coast so I’ll spare you… for now.

The next day we explored old Nice, walked along the beach and just soaked up the ambiance of the town. Our PEI family will be pleased to know that the pebbly beach in Nice is a treasure trove of beach glass.oldnicealimenice

The key discovery of the day however came in the afternoon when George and I discovered our new favourite brews, Timmerman’s Kreik (cherry beer) and Timmerman’s Framboise (rasberry beer). IMG 2807IMG 2806 We plan to begin importing it to Canada in bulk as soon as we get them to correct the slight typo in the name.

The next day we picked up our rental car (from the friendly and efficient folks at Europcar) and drove west to St. Tropez; capital of the ‘jet set’. We arrived in the town centre where we picked up a map and you guessed it started with the harbour.sttropezharboursttropezlighthousesttropezsails From there we walked around the point and up another castle hill, this time with the castle largely intact as they managed to pay Louis XIV off before he got around to tearing it down.sttropeztree2sttropeztreeviewsttropezvistasttropezfortviewsttropezfortsttropezgeorge Of course the boats were also visible from the hill…sttropezspinakers …and this oddly pretty cemetary right at the water’s edge.sttropezcem …and this striking cannon.sttropezcannon After taking in the hill top sights we began making our way back down through the old city…stropezcathad a great lunch at ‘The Citadel’…sttropezcitadeland then drove off for the beach.sttropeztahiti We were pleased that this part of the coast is covered in your more traditional sand rather than the pebbles of Nice.sttropezbeachsttropezalisttropezme

In the late afternoon we drove back along the coast through Cannes (no celebs, just a quick ice cream) and Antibes…

Today we took off in the other direction heading east along the Corniches (basically a series of really narrow, twisty roads blasted into the rock; let’s just say I’m ready for Gran Turismo 4 when I get back) to Monaco. We passed through a bunch of great little sea side towns, with the first one being Villefranche-sur-mer.villefranche From there we twisted and turned our way to the badly misnamed town of Eze. I say badly misnamed as it’s built into the side of a cliff and the whole place is one steep staircase. A really pretty staircase though.IMG 2945IMG 2956IMG 2961IMG 2967IMG 2970IMG 2972IMG 2974IMG 2975IMG 2977IMG 2981IMG 2990IMG 2994IMG 2997 There’s a five star hotel carved into the rock in what used to be the King of Sweden’s pad, lot’s of neat boutique’s and good looking restraunts, if they’d put in an elevator down to the beach I think I could live here.

Our next stop was the tiny principality of Monaco. Monaco is famous for being the size of a postage stamp, for it’s casino, it’s Grand Prix, it’s Princes and the big boats in it’s harbour. We saw evidence of all four. IMG 3003IMG 3006IMG7 1IMG24 1IMG25 1IMG50 1IMG70 1IMG99IMG115 1IMG116 1IMG124 1IMG150 1IMG139 1

The Grimaldi’s who are Monaco’s Royal Family have a strange history, in front of the palace is this statue to the first Prince. He became Prince by dressing up as a monk, sneaking into the monastery on top of the hill and ‘overcoming’ (read killing) the monks before declaring himself ruler.grimaldi Perhaps as a result of this checkered past and to prevent anyone pulling the same trick on them, the Prince’s of Monaco have seen fit to make every second citizen a guard or a police officer. Including this fellow who arrested George for climbing in one of the Royal Palm Trees.guardgeorgetree George was sentenced to be fired from a cannon into the harbour.georgecannon Fortunately, this kind fellow on his 58 meter long sailboat happened by and fished him out.fiftyeight

All and all a fantastic taste of the fabulous French Riviera. I’m going to sign off here as it’s getting late and we’ve got an early train tommorrow to Venice.

Cheers,

Mark & Ali

Avignon

Published on April 16, 2005 in Travel. 8 Comments Tags: , , , .

This update should get us close to being up to date again… After Caen we hopped a train for Paris that evening, stayed over night and hoped a train to Avignon first thing in the morning. This was one of the TGV trains that the French are so proud of and rightly so; it’s a great way to travel. We arrived in Avignon, sometime alternative to the Vatican as the home of the Pope. This is a great little town; with a fantastic central square 30 meters from our hotel where we enjoyed good coffee, excellent Belgian beer and the like.IMG 2543 The town is walled and contains the almost completely intact Palais de Papes construction of which was started in 1335 and completed 20 years later. IMG 2550IMG 2568IMG 2574IMG 2598 The gardens above the palace were a great place for a stroll on what was a glorious sunny day…IMG 2603 …if a touch windy.IMG 2678 The building behind Ali is the Chapterhouse; it’s one of several mansions built by the Cardinals who chose to live in the French city of Villeneuve across the river rather than be subject to the Pope’s law in Avignon. To visit the Pope and attend to church business they crossed the St Bénezet bridge which had two chapels built on it as a way of collecting ‘tolls’ from the Cardinals and pilgrims as they crossed it. The bridge is also known from the supposedly famous French song “Sur le Pont d’Avignon…” though neither Ali or I had ever heard of it.IMG 2656IMG 2662IMG 2669IMG 2696IMG 2715IMG 2725
All in all a great day in Avignon. The following day we hopped back on the TGV to Nice and have settled in here for a few days, with side trips planned for St. Tropez, Monico and the like before heading off to Italy.

Cheers,

Mark & Ali
P.S. Joanne, we didn’t make Mont-St-Michel due to the wildly incompetant and unfriendly folks at Hertz gumming up our car rental. We won’t be using them again, ever.

P.P.S. Steve (with apologies to Cara) this one’s for you.cara

P.P.P.S. Dad this one’s for you, thank’s for getting Ronin ready for the water and be glad (or sad) that neither of us has as much teak to sand and varnish as this fellow.saildad

Normandy

Published on April 15, 2005 in Travel. 3 Comments Tags: , , , .

Sorry we haven’t posted any updates in the last little while, we’ve been moving from town to town pretty quickly and haven’t had a chance to jack in. Since we last updated you all we spent one more day in Paris, just walking around, taking in the sights, sounds and smells before boarding a train for Rouen in Normandy. Notably we saw a youth street march (half rave half protest) and the start of the Paris Marathon.Paris Street MarchParis Marathon In Rouen we saw the site where Joan of Arc was burned at the stake. And another day an ‘autre dame’, this time Notre Dame de Rouen.IMG 2345IMG 2348IMG 2360IMG 2363IMG 2369IMG 2374IMG 2384IMG 2396IMG 2404IMG 2409 Our update on Rouen wouldn’t be complete without mentioning the fantastic service we got at the Hotel Vieux Marche. It’s right in the heart or Rouen and the staff were amazingly helpful. From Rouen it was an EARLY morning train ride to Caen to make our tour of the D-Day landing beaches.IMG 2424 George liked the empty train as he got his own seat.IMG 2426

We arived at the Caen Memorial where we met Sandrine our guide. She was also great, in fact everyone we encountered in Normandy was universally helpful and forgiving of our broken franglais. Our first stop was the Canadian Cemetary where the casulties from Juno Beach were buried. It was a really moving sight, each of the headstones has the age of the soldier on it and the impact of seeing so many young lives cut short is hard to describe.IMG 2450IMG 2441IMG 2451 From there we went to Juno Beach itself; it felt very strange, on the one hand it’s a stunningly beautiful place, on the other it’s the site of so much pain, in the end you’re left kind of drained not knowing what to think or feel.IMG 2455 We then went along the coast past Sword Beach (where the British landed) to Omaha Beach one of two American landing points and the site of the most intense fighting on D-Day.IMG 2467IMG 2471The American Cemetary was also very moving with the plain white Crosses and Stars of David, gorgeous statues and maps showing the progress of the liberation.IMG 2477IMG 2488IMG 2493IMG 2498IMG 2533 This one’s for you James.IMG 2539

I’m going to sign off here as the waters of the Mediteranean are calling, we’re in Nice now and will be for a few days , so I’ll update you on our visit to Avignon (yesterday and the day before) and what we do here tonight or tomorrow.

Cheers,

Mark & Ali

Blahh, Paris in the Rain?

Published on April 8, 2005 in Travel. 14 Comments Tags: , , , .

Yesterday and today were rainy in Paris and the ‘mal’ weather is supposed to continue all week, so we may head for the Cote D’Azur sooner than we planned. Yesterday however was a fantastic day. We started out at Notre Dame cathedral. We’ve seen a lot of churches on our journey so far but this was architecturally the most beautiful, it was also poignant as it was the day before John Paul II’s funeral and this is the spiritual heart of Catholicism in France.
Notre DameIMG 2001IMG 2002IMG 2007IMG 2014IMG 2055IMG 2056IMG 2057Ali with MagnoliasIMG 2070

We then headed north west for the Arc de Trimophe, passing this great statue to Charlemange on the way.IMG 2051 Despite the grey skies the view from the Arc was ‘magnifique’.IMG 2073IMG 2099IMG 2105IMG 2106IMG 2107IMG 2119IMG 2121IMG 2131IMG 2133IMG 2135IMG 2143IMG 2144 This sign; Paris’ logo as a candidate city for the 2012 games is everywhere, on every government building, on every subway car, etc.IMG 2146 George loved the view as well though it was hard to keep him from imitating his cousin Kong.georgearc The Arc is also beautiful from the bottom with excellent sculpture and the French Tomb of the Unknown Soldier.IMG 2073 01IMG 2088IMG 2089IMG 2092IMG 2093IMG 2094 If you didn’t know better you’d think Napoleon was a good guy… From the Arc we started to make our way to the Effiel Tower. Along the way we stopped for coffee and a beer and met a lady who told us the site of Princess Di and Dodi Fayed’s car wreck was across the street. IMG 2166IMG 2165 The whole bridge/overpass is covered in grafitti expressing love and good wishes for Diana from people all over the world.IMG 2161IMG 2162IMG 2164 Not sure whether you can make it out in the photos but one that I though was particularly eloquent read “You may have been England’s future Queen but you were OUR Princess”. I was never a Dianophile but you couldn’t help but be moved. From there we continued our slightly soggy walk to Le Tour Effiel. Our guidebooks said don’t bother if it’s grey or rainy but we decided to go anyway. IMG 2173IMG 2179 This sign made us a little home sick.IMG 2185 But only a little as this was the view across those 6,000+ kilometers.IMG 2186 The rain continued but the sun poked through occaisionally.IMG 2191IMG 2212IMG 2223 We loved the view but we were wondering how great it would be on a clear day until we saw this…IMG 2227IMG 2231IMG 2238IMG 2240 Needless to say George enjoyed the view as well.IMG 2265IMG 2276 After the sunset we ate dinner in the Tour’s restaurant where I had my first European oysters, they were good but the Malpeque boys have nothing to worry about. After dinner we took in the city lights. The pictures don’t quite do it justice but since we can’t invite you all along with us they’ll have to do.IMG 2292IMG 2304IMG 2311IMG 2321IMG 2324IMG 2333

After a perfect day we hopped on “le metro” back to our closet. In case you think I’m exaggerating how small our room is as I write this I’m lying on the bed and if I point my toes I can touch the bathroom door. However it’s clean and in a handy location in a great city so don’t think we’re complaining.

Today we awoke to serious rain. So we decided to use the time to plan the next leg of our journey before heading to the Musee Picasso. They don’t allow photographs in the museum so you’ll have to take our word for it that it’s a must do if you are in Paris. After that we went shopping/browsing in an area called “le Marais”, stopping for a coffee and what I thought would be a quick beer. The metric system and beer just don’t mix. A regular bottle of beer is 33cl, they also sell 50cl which is smaller than a pint (which is the perfect size for a beer) and finally a 100cl ‘jumbo’ beer. Anyway I learned that my french doesn’t yet cover ‘biere’ and wound up with the litre size. Took a while to drink but since the French don’t make much beer of their own at least it was a tasty Belgian brew. After that Italian food for dinner and back to the room to do the laundry. Anyway, need to sign off here as it’s time to wring out the socks.

Cheers,

Mark & Ali

P.S. We know you’ve subscribed, we know you’re reading the site, we miss you, so we’d love to hear from you. For our regular commenters thanks for your updates on life back at home it keeps us plugged in. Congrats to Mike and Karen on the new addition to the family, glad he’s got all the right parts in all the right sizes.

Ahh, Paris in the Spring time…

Published on April 7, 2005 in Travel. 7 Comments Tags: , , , .

Hi folks, just a quick update to let you know we arrived safely in Paris on Tuesday by train from Amsterdam. The ride took about four hours and was great. We checked in to our hotel and then took a walk around the city; we particularly liked walking on the banks of the Seine near the Francois Mitterand bridge across from the Palais Royale. Ali on the SeineSeine1Seine2IMG 1651
We turned in early and yesterday started our for the Louvre first thing in the morning. We ate bagels and espresso by the reflecting pond in the Louvre gardens.IMG 1652 And then on to the main event the painting and sculpture sections of the Louvre. This place is huge, our guidebook suggestions that just to glance at everything in it would take 8 months. We ended up taking almost 300 pictures over almost 8 hours, so we agree it’s vast. I haven’t sorted through all of them yet but here’s a taste.IMG48 (Lisa T, we think this is the one you mentioned to Ali?)IMG61IMG117IMG156IMG164IMG203IMG208IMG227IMG232 As we expected George was pretty chilled out on the train trip and on our first day in Paris. However yesterday he was up to his old tricks again. The Mona Lisa has a new gallery at the Louvre and yesterday at 2:00 was it’s first showing for 3 days while she was moved to her new home. The crowd was pretty big though the line moved quickly and we did eventually get some good shots. George however just walked between people’s legs, climbed right up and said “Hi Mona, how’s it going?”IMG69

Cheers,

Mark & Ali

P.S. We’ve been trying out our French and so far we’ve been pleasantly surprised how quickly the high school stuff comes back to us… Ali says Stan the Man and Ms. Cheverie would say “tres bien”.

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