Vacances de la Toussaint, Part 4: Day Trips with Sarah

On October 26, my friend Sarah came to visit. Sarah went to Smith and studied abroad in Paris with me and she is currently doing TAPIF in the north of France. The first afternoon we planned the rest of our trip and then walked up to the center of Grasse to get a nice view.

The next day we went to Villefranche-sur-Mer, which is just past Nice on the train. I had heard that it was a very cute town and it looked beautiful whenever I passed it on the train. 

We arrived shortly before noon and walked around the town to check out the restaurant offerings. We decided on a restaurant with a set lunch menu for 18 euros that included a hot goat cheese salad, lasagna, and speculoos tiramisu. It was very good! 

After lunch we went into La Chapelle St Pierre, which is decorated by Jean Cocteau. (No photos allowed inside, but google it if you're interested.)

We then climbed up to an old fort where there were nice views and a few small museums. The first museum was sculptures by Volti, and it was kind of weird because it was basically lots of sculptures of naked women housed in what seemed like a dungeon. There was also a little art museum with some paintings and a figurine museum. 

We walked around a nice garden before going back down the hill and walking along the beach. In the evening we took the train back to Cannes and climbed up the hill to watch the sunset. We walked along the beach and then had burgers and frappes for dinner at Steak ‘n Shake.

The next day we went to Vintimille, a city in Italy that is just over the border from France. The Friday market was supposed to be particularly nice, but we found it to be fairly tacky and touristy. We walked around for the morning and saw some nice views then had some very crummy Italian food for lunch, including a still-frozen pre-packaged tiramisu. 

We went to Menton for the afternoon, which we much preferred even though it was cloudy. We walked along the beach and collected sea glass and then climbed up the cool staircase toward the cathedral. 

We visited an interesting cemetery at the top of the hill and then met up with Russian Marina and her friend to walk around the town and sample some of Menton’s famous limoncello. 

Sarah and I ate dinner at a creperie and the owner (?) and another patron chatted with us and told us that our French accents were very good and at first they thought we were Belgian or something. He later said that my accent was almost Parisian and that Sarah had a northern France accent. I know my French isn’t quite that good, but it always feels great to get compliments on my French anyway!

The next day we explored Grasse some more. We met Russian Marina and her friends at the Fragonard Perfumerie for a free tour of the factory. Then Sarah and I went up to the center of Grasse and saw some of the free museums about perfume, art, and culture of the area. We had violet ice cream and then returned to my apartment to prepare for our trip to Marseille the next day.

Vacances de la Toussaint, Part 3: Beach Day in Cannes

On October 24, it was warm and sunny, so Katie and I went into Cannes to spend the afternoon at the beach. It was so weird to be lounging on the beach in October. It never gets very cold here and even now it still usually feels like spring. There are even still flowers on bushes. I got ice cream, of course, and even put my feet in the water, which was surprisingly warm. It was Katie’s first time really visiting Cannes, so after the beach we looked at some of the celebrity hand prints near the Palais des Festivals where they have the Cannes Film Festival every year and then we climbed a hill up to a church and old chateau to get a good view of the city and the sea. 

I’m not very good at blogging…

To anyone trying to follow my blog, I’m sorry that I’m so bad at blogging consistently! I haven’t forgotten about my blog, I just keep putting off posting. I’ve never been good at regularly keeping up blogs or journals. I think part of the reason is that I’m too much of a perfectionist and I don’t want to post something unless I’ve spent a lot of time carefully writing and choosing the photos. The more I get behind, the more daunting a task it is to try to catch up.

The first semester is over and I’m now on Christmas break! I know I haven’t posted anything yet about teaching, but I’m going to be traveling soon and I hope to have some time to work on blog posts on the train. I’ll try really hard to be better at keeping up with my blog in the future, but I can’t make any promises… 

Vacances de la Toussaint, Part 2: A Rainy Afternoon in Antibes

Even though today was one of the rare rainy days on the Côte d’Azur, Helen and I decided to spend a few hours in Antibes. We took a train that arrived around 11 am and spent the first two hours walking around and seeing the harbor, a statue, and the beach.

We decided to eat lunch at one of the restaurants that I remember from my first time in Antibes during my year abroad in Paris. I remember having an amazing savory crepe with roasted vegetables, pesto, and pine nuts. The experience this time was disappointing. When we first arrived, all of the restaurant staff ignored us, leaving us guessing as to whether we should seat ourselves or wait to be seated. After seating ourselves indoors since it was still raining, we had to wait a long time for anyone to even bring us a menu and then wait again for someone to take our order. The restaurant wasn’t even that busy, but the waiters wouldn’t even look at us, which made catching their eye to ask for something difficult. When our food finally came, my crepe was good but not nearly as good as I remember it being last time, and Helen’s was very over-cooked. We wanted to try a sweet crepe, but after waiting for well over 20 minutes after our plates were cleared for someone to pay us any attention we gave up on dessert and asked for the check. Overall it was a very disappointing experience as the food was just OK and we felt completely ignored by the staff the whole time.

After eating, since it was still raining, we decided we would spend the rest of the afternoon in the Musée Picasso. However, when we arrived at the museum, the line for entry was out the door —probably at least 50 people long! It seemed that given the rain, everyone else had the same idea we did. We decided to visit the museum another day and take an earlier train home. 

On the way to get the train, we stopped in a bakery and got raspberry tarts to make up for missing out on dessert crepes at lunch. 

Even though things didn’t go perfectly for Helen’s first visit to Antibes, it was still a nice afternoon.  It was really nice to get to spend some time with Helen and whet her appetite for what Antibes has to offer.

Vacances de la Toussaint, Part 1: Antibes and Menton

After only 2.5 weeks of work (I’ll post about that soon…) we already have a 2-week vacation. On Thursday, the first day of break, I met my friend Russian Marina in Antibes for the afternoon (I also know an Italian Marina and a French Marina, so it can be confusing). We spent a nice relaxing afternoon eating ice cream, walking around, and searching for sea glass and smooth stones on the beach. I really love Antibes, and I’m planning to go back tomorrow afternoon.

Pebbles and sea glass on the beach

Antibes

Antibes

Sunset from the train on the way home

Sunset from the train

I had been planning to take a day trip on Friday to Ventimiglia with two other English language assistants, Katie and Helen. Ventimiglia is the last stop on the train line that passes through Grasse, and it is just over the border in Italy. Normally all of the trains that pass through Grasse have Ventimiglia as their destination, but when we were looking at train times on Thursday evening, there were no trains listed going to Ventimiglia on Friday morning. We later learned that there was a transportation strike in Italy that day. Instead, we decided to spend the day in Menton, the last stop in France before Italy. It was another beautiful and relaxing day. The weather was gorgeous, although a little windy. We didn’t really do anything specific, just walked around the city, had lunch and ice cream, and walked along the beach. Menton is known for its lemons and it also has some famous gardens that we didn’t see, so I’m planning to go back sometime to see the gardens and explore the little city more. 

Menton

Menton lemons

Menton

Creepy turquoise cat at a market in Menton

Gnocchi for lunch

Interesting stairway leading to a church

We walked along an old fort, built to protect the city from the Spanish (who were in charge of Monaco at the time).

Gorgeous views of the harbor and city