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Sunday
All settled in and mildly rested and its up and off to Grasse, the perfume capital of the world, or so it seemed. The guide books tell us that because Grasse is an old ( aren't they all?) hill top town, it can be hard to navigate. Need I say more?
For 90% of the time it was all uphill, but with our trusty map and google maps on the iphone, all was not lost.
After only one circumnavigation of the town, we found the Fragonard perfume factory and museum and mission accomplished!
A bit more of a wander and rounding the corner, we arrived at the bus station as this was a far more tortuous way to get to our next destination, Cannes, than simply getting a train. Finding Cannes singularly unimpressive, we took the train back to Juan les Pins, arriving just in time for a 2 hr walk in the hot afternoon sun out to Cap D'Antibes.
Monday was Monaco. A very impressive and noticeably affluent principality. We walked up (it seems everything we want to see is up!) to the Royal Palace and spent quite a time exploring the streets and shops before taking a tourist train to see the sights. Back up to the Palace and lunch in the gardens before setting off to find the bus station to catch a bus to Eze.
Eze is a serious hilltop town. More of an eagle's eiree than a human habitation. The gardens that have been established in the ruins of the medieval castle are predominately cacti, and they are thriving. It seemed so out of place on top of a hill, 1000m plus above sea level. Having seen all there was to see, and preferring not to risk the bus ride back down the mountain, we took the Nietze footpath, about a 1.5 hour slip, slide and stumble down a loose rocky path. Anyway, the whole experience was worth the effort and the views down were spectacular. The only other sign of life that we saw, apart from the little lizards was one lone Japanese girl coming up the path looking somewhat ill-equipped for the climb ahead.
Tuesday
Two towns to tick off the list today, Vence, the home of Henri Matisse and then St Paul de Vence where Marc Chagall spent much of his life. Again, both walled towns perched on top of the mountain.
The bus to Vence was 15 mins late arriving at the stop at the bottom of the mountain. By the time we reached Vence, about 20 mins later, we were on time. A white knuckle ride if ever there was one. Vence is a beautiful place, made more so by the fact that the tour buses don't go there! Matisse also spent a considerable part of his life in the area and his legacy is a chapel that he designed and decorated which again, was quite special. There were three floor to ceiling coloured glass panels done in the Matisse style of flowers, that when the sun shone through them, cast a pattern of blue and gold across the white marble floor.
A short bus ride further down the hill to St Paul de Vence, this time a walled town. Having bought tapas and olives from a stall in the market and fresh bread and cheese, we found a seat under an olive tree looking out across the valley and spent a very pleasant hour having lunch. With Gelati to sustain us for the afternoon, we wandered around the town before catching the bus back down to the train station. Fortunately, this driver was not running late and although the bus was packed, we arrived at sea level unscathed.
As this was our last day in France, we went out for a big feed in preparation for our next Italian train adventure in the morning.
Wednesday
First train from Juan les Pins to Ventimiglia on the Italian border:- on time, space for the suitcases and a seat for both of us.
Ventimiglia to Genoa: Italian train, on the platform a party of Americans en route to Milan who tell us that because it is a 2 hour trip to Milan ( its 4) lunch will be served. I thought that we should be grateful the train was at the platform and that any thought of lunch being "served" was fanciful. We told them that there would be a food cart go through and that was as good as it was going to get.
Anyway with train on time, baggage stowed we settled in for the 4 hour trip. In a compartment of 6, shared with a Russian couple and a Spanish couple who did not validate their train ticket before boarding. With the assistance of a Spanish speaking American guy from the next compartment, the ticket inspector explained what they should have done with the tickets and then hit them with a €50 fine! The Russian couple thought it was outrageous that the inspector would impose a fine, especially as the Spaniards did not speak or understand Italian.
Arrival in Genoa without any problems, settle in for what we believe is a comfortable time when connecting from one Italian train to another, that being 2 hrs to allow for late trains. However in this case we arrived on time and our connecting train was 35 mins late, but not to worry, we hopped on and arrived in La Spezia, found where the local bus to Lerici went from and waited. 10 mins later it arrived, we climbed on, me with the 2 suitcases and Jean with the money, only it appeared that the driver had run out of tickets or couldn't be bothered and told Jean to sit down. Result, free ride to Lerici with the bus stop over the road from our hotel, so a end to a good travel day.
Tomorrow, it's off again to see the sights.
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