Nice--Unlike Anywhere Else

We've spent the last few days in Nice. It is big and very crowded and was initially a bit overwhelming. We've now gotten more into its rhythm. It is an uncommonly pretty city and unlike anywhere else we've ever visited. It has a distinctive architecture and big public spaces. It's very much a city in France, but to us it seems more Italian than French.

It is purely coincidental that we have broken our trip into two segments--one part of France on the Spanish border and another on the Italian border--that have given us such noticeably different tastes of France. For the first two weeks, we were steeped in all things Catalan. Now, for the past two+ weeks, we've been experiencing an interesting blend of French/Italian ambience.

It shouldn't be too much of a surprise that Nice has an Italian flavor to it. After all, it was Italian until only 150 years ago. We weren't terribly surprised to see pizza shops and fresh pasta purveyors and yummy corner gelato shops. We'd seen them in Antibes, too, which is only about a half hour away by car. But the city really hit us as looking and feeling Italian. In Antibes, it never occurred to us that we were anywhere but in France. Nice? Not so much.

On Sunday, using a Rick Steve's guide, we took a walk through Old Nice. We'd already walked through it several times the day before and thought we'd gotten a pretty good idea of its character, sounds, and smells. But the suggested walking route took us off into little side streets and hidden squares. Rick even describes one of the neighborhoods as "Little Naples." Many of the names sound Italian, such as Place Rossetti. All street names are shown in French and in the old Nicoise dialect.

The narrow streets feel even narrower, because the buildings are 5 and 6 stories tall, not the 2 to 3 stories we're used to seeing. All windows have tall wooden shutters and many have iron grillwork on little balconies--further exaggerating the very narrow feeling of the streets. When you look down the crowded little streets, you'd swear the buildings on each side are leaning toward each other.

We have been steeping ourselves in art and the famous market street, Cours Saleya. Another important part of being in Nice is walking the legendary Promenade des Anglais (English Promenade) along the beautiful crescent sweep of the Baie des Anges (Bay of Angels), with its famous pebble beaches. There is a constant parade of people and runners and bicycles (and the ubiquitous little white tourist trains), and we have spent a lot of time being a part of that scene.

We've ridden the buses several times to get to the museums that are up the hill in Cimiez, one of the nicest Nice residential districts and about a half hour ride away from the main square. We visited the Chagall Museum almost as soon as we got to town and checked in to our hotel. Matisse we saved for Monday, when lots of other things are closed. By having to find a specific bus stop to hook up with the route that would take us to Cimiez, we were forced to get acquainted with the layout of downtown Nice. We are quite proud of the fact that, after only a few days, we no longer need to have a map in hand and can find our way around. (Of course, we have somewhat confined ourselves to a small segment of this, France's fifth largest city. Still....)

The big market is closed on Monday. We'd read that there is an antiques market instead, so we thought we'd wander through. It was the best we've ever seen! It went on for block after block of Cours Saleya. There were sellers on either side of a central passage and more on the outside edges. Just when we were flagging and our eyes were starting to glaze, the market tumbled into a large square with dozens more sellers. Initially, we were just going to pass through the antique market on our way to getting a bus to the Matisse Museum, but ended up spending a happy couple of hours just looking at all the ceramics, crystal, silver, jewelry, linens, art, and all sorts of whatnots. We found a wonderful addition for Jerry's collection of antique tastevins--not only a very high quality sterling silver and an unusual design, but also small and unbreakable, making it a perfect travel souvenir.

To get to our bus stop, we had to cross the lively and massive Place Massena, filled with people and traffic and modern trams and mounted police and more people. The Place is flanked by a long set of park blocks called the Promenade du Paillon. This park area has two large sections of fountains that at times are gently wet, with children frolicking in the watery aftermath of the fountains and at other times are "performing" fountains. It is quite fun to sit and watch them for awhile, and it is a very popular place for people to sit on the many chairs and benches to eat their midday sandwiches. The antics of the water geysers, which appear randomly from the flat surface, never fail to bring smiles to viewers or passers by.

Eventually, we caught our bus and climbed the hill to Cimiez. Once we emerged from the bus, we made several missteps in our attempt to find the museum and wound up at a lovely little 16th century Franciscan monastery with a beautiful garden that includes a view to the hills to the east of the Nice port area and out to the sea. We ended up walking about three times as far as we needed to, but found the museum at last. It is a small but interesting Matisse collection, housed in a 17th century villa in an olive grove, next to the ruins of an ancient Roman city.

Monday night, we wandered the funny little streets and squares of the old town, looking for somewhere to eat. We kept turning down narrower and narrower streets and settled on a perfect little restaurant. All the tables are outside--two rows of tables in front, continuing around the corner with two sets of tables, one on each side of the even narrower side street. It was quite interesting eating with street traffic passing between our tables--only single file possible (fortunately, no motorcycles or scooters, but we did get a pair of bikes come past our table). It was one of the better meals we've had and one of the least costly. A happy find.

Tuesday is our last day in Nice and the final day of our fabulous trip in France. The Languedoc portion of our trip was a completely different world from this interesting stay on the Riviera. It feels like we are light years away from our time in the hills and vineyards of the Languedoc, and yet it was only a couple weeks ago. Both trip segments were wonderfully enjoyable, and we wouldn't change anything to speak of. The scenery has been top notch in both cases. The history, the experiences, the discoveries--all has been an unqualified success.

Now we must leave the turquoise waters of the Mediterranean behind. We're not looking forward to the long slog home, but we are looking forward to being back in our own home and amongst our family and friends. This has been a long trip and we're ready to transition back into our "real world." But, oh, that beautiful blue sea...sigh.


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