South of France Part Trois
My trip through the south of France was coming to an end but I still had one section left and it was arguably the most speculator: the Côte d'Azur.
Stationing myself in the areas largest and arguably most famous city, Nice, I spent just over a week pretending to be a lot richer than I am and trying almost desperately to present myself as someone who wasn't living out of a lightly packed bag for months.
While it took some time for me to get used to sand less beaches, the freezing water and the fact that people paid to sunbathe on certain strips of beach, I quickly developed a crush on Nice and it's surroundings.
Nice, itself, was somewhat surprising purely because of how relaxed it was compared to my expectations and the way it strangely felt like any beautiful beach town in Australia while also being completely different (mostly due to the lack of sand and slip, slop, slap advertisement and the addition of pastis).
It was also both similar and different to all the other places I had visited in France so far mainly due to the huge number of backpackers and Contiki stopovers, who all seemed to migrate to the same bar and drunk 2 am take away, mixed in with the locals and domestic tourists.
Beyond Nice, there were plenty of other towns that I visited, many with famous names but the one that I enjoyed the most was also (unsurprising) one of the few sandy beaches in the area: Antibes.
Less flashy than its neighbours Cannes and Saint-Tropez but also firmly, like 99% of the beach towns along the Côte d'Azur, on the tourist trail even the most pessimistic person on earth, would find Antibes nothing short of charming. From the markets to the coastal walk, which includes views that Picasso deemed good enough to paint, it is as close as you can get to your dream Mediterranean getaway.
Another slightly hidden gem that I discovered was Cap-d'Ail. Situated along the coast leading up to Monaco, Cap-d'Ail was the only town around Nice that I visited twice and I would happily spend the rest of my life floating in the still water there with a bottle of red. Beloved by the wealthy and powerful of yesteryear like Charlie Chaplin and Sir Winston Churchill, this beautiful coastline was peaceful and intoxicating in every sense.
On the more tourist side I also made a trip to Monaco for the day which was beautiful but only really interesting if you are a) super rich b) looking to be a sugar baby c) love gambling and went to dangle my legs over the Italian border in a Walk to Remember like moment in Menton.
To summarise quite bluntly: Yes Nice was, well, nice.