Saturday in Nice and Monaco

Posted on 2014/09/11 12:52:46 (September 2014).

[Saturday 6th September 2014]
Our hotel in Nice was pretty basic, and our rate didn't include breakfast, so in the morning we decided to head out for a stroll around the town to try and find somewhere nice to have the obligatory croissant or something.

We ended up wandering all the way to the seafront, then into the old town, and were naturally drawn to the market there which had all sorts of tantalising fruit and vegetables on display. In addition to a couple of peaches, we bought some surprisingly good croissants, which we ended up eating oddly in a sort of aleyway, as it was shady - even at this time of the morning, in September, the sun was quite strong.

We continued our wander through the old town which led us to Fenocchio, the gelateria in the nice little square (Place Rossetti?) which all feels rather Italian. Despite the slightly odd time of day - just before noon - we decided to have some gelato. We picked a fairly neutral flavour for Erika (fior di latte) and more exotic flavours for us (violet for me and some kind of sorbet for Chie), and of course Erika then decided she wanted to eat ours instead.

In the sort of backwards fashion that somehow seems permissible when on holiday, we then proceeded to think about lunch, and I was very pleased to find I had some personalised recommendations in Google Maps, which, based on places we'd been to on previous trips to Nice, suggested we give Rene Socca a try. I think it's a bit of an institution to Nice, but having always just bumbled around like an ignorant tourist in the past I hadn't actually heard of it. Apparently though this is the place to go for socca - and other Nicoise specialities like beignets de fleurs de courgettes. I had developed a bit of a taste for socca having had it where it apparently originated, in Genoa, earlier this year. In Italy they call it farinata instead. The downside of Rene Socca's apparent institution status is the queue - we found a table no problem, but then figured out for the food you have to go and queue at a counter, and I think the wait could well have been the best part of half an hour. Confusingly though we were able to order some of the food whilst only part way though the queue, so Erika and Chie were able to get stuck into the various fried things whilst I stayed in the queue to the bitter end for the famous socca. It was actually pretty good, I have to admit.

After lunch we meandered vaguely back in the direction of the station, and Erika dozed off in her buggy. On the way we stopped off in a cafe for a "cafe noisette" which I discovered is apparently the French answer to a macchiato.

We picked up our luggage from the hotel, and got on a train to Monaco some time after 3. Erika continued to doze until we arrived in Monaco.

As seems to be the tradition, we had a bit of a frustrating time on arrival getting from the station to our hotel. We used the funny little intercom to call for a taxi, but gave up waiting after 15 minutes, and decided to try walking at least some of the way. I think the mistake we then made was to go out the wrong exit of the station, which is more designed for heading to the west of Monaco, whereas our hotel was right over at the eastern border. We then got a bus some of the way, but perhaps not the bus we should have got on. In the end it took about an hour to get to our hotel which seemed like a bit of a waste really, as we were keen to go and jump in the swimming pool as soon as we could.

Still, we soon cheered up when we did finally arrive, our room had a nice balcony with a sea view as they always seem to at the Monte Carlo Bay, and moments after dropping off our bags we were heading down to the swimming pool.

I'm happy to report Erika seemed to really enjoy the swimming pool on this trip, having been a bit unsure this time last year - and she really didn't want to get out. There's a great area for kids with an extremely shallow ankle high area, that also has fountains etc, which Erika loved splashing about in. Plus there were a few other young kids there, which helped to build Erika's confidence in the water. To begin with she wanted us to hold onto her whenever she was in the water, but gradually she became comfortable to just float by herself. It was really lovely to watch.

After our good long swim our stomachs inevitably started to rumble (what is it about swimming that makes you hungry?) and we decided to head out for dinner. I'd decided we should go to a pizza place I'd found which has a wood fired oven (apparently something of a rarity in Monaco) and tables on the beach. It turned out to be the perfect choice - there were lots of other kids milling about and Erika really enjoyed having bursts of running about on the beach, and going up and down the slide, in between mouthfuls. Since we were in Monaco I ordered a bottle of Champagne to go with our dinner, and after we were finished eating we took our glasses and finished it off sitting on the beach in the moonlight. It was really quite magical.

Post a comment