The French Riviera is Nice! (Nice)

Hola todos,

Travel days are always a bit rough on me. I don't sleep well on planes (who does?) and depending on the time of the flight, the layover, and the time change, I am bound to be a bit of a mess upon getting to my destination. This time was no different, but at least my destination was a sun-soaked beach. All I had to do was remind myself that in 12 (or so) hours, I would be here:

We flew from New York to Nice with a brief layover in Lisbon--it was an overnight flight, with the intent to catch some zzzs, but I watched the penultimate Mission Impossible (which I hadn't seen yet, and I am such a sucker for a good spy-action movie!) and so landed in Lisbon without having slept.

Fortunately, my trustworthy travel companion let me sleep in the Lisbon airport while we waited to board our flight to France. Meanwhile, she grabbed a pastel de nata--a delicious Portuguese custard tart.

 

When we landed in Nice, we tried to get the bus into town. Unfortunately, the ticket machine was not working, so we bounced around between tram and bus stations (all near the airport) until we managed to figure out how to get to our airbnb.

A few stops later, after passing through the heart of the commerce and business district and into Old Town Nice, we got to our little maison for the next few days.  It was on the fifth floor of an apartment building--which, in Europe, means the sixth floor, as the ground floor isn't given a number!--but that led to great natural light through the windows and beautiful views. (And we worked up our appetites.)

 

The view out of our living room window (left) and the view of our little street (right).

We grabbed lunch at a local spot and then set off walking around Old Town and the Promenade d'Anglais, which is the the main walking path along the coast, and came back around through the commerce district. Between the beach, the coast line, and the beautiful buildings, we had plenty to see.

 

  

Jet-lagged and on sleep-fumes, we went back to the airbnb for a nap. (And by "we", I mean "me".)  After feeling refreshed, we set off again to 1) get cash from an ATM (very important!) and 2) see the sunset along the beach and explore Nice some more.

 

The evening glow on the water and the hillside was just so beautiful. There were so many people out and about, and while the town wasn't loud, it was quite vibrant. We walked along the Promenade d'Anglais (the opposite direction from before) and came across some sculptures and features.

 

The sea urchin.

The #ILoveNice sign.

And lots and lots of yachts.

On our walk back to the airbnb, we took a quick detour through the Cours Saleya market, an open-air artisans market just off the beach. We ended up strolling through the market several nights throughout our time in Nice.

The next day, we (I) slept in quite late--the jet lag was brutal!--so we had a slow morning (or at least what was left of it) and walked over to the beach to lounge for most of the day. The water! So blue! So crisp!

We also ventured off toward the downtown commercial district, too--there are so many restaurants and shops, and lots of beautiful buildings.  This was the main square:

Eze

One of the days, we took a little half-day trip to Eze (pronounced "EHz-uh", or at least I hope so because that is how I kept pronouncing it...). It is a cute little medieval town on the mountainside about a 40-minute bus ride, or 25 minute train ride, from Nice. Both the bus and the train travel along the coast, so the views while you commute are spectacular. We took the bus to Eze, because it drops off in the town proper.

Eze was very vertical--we definitely got our climbing workout in that day--but was so cute to walk around and explore. There were some restaurants, lots of artisan shops, and a ton of photo opportunities.

 

 

To get back to Nice, we decided to hike down the mountain from Eze to the train station. It was about an hour-long hike and a bit harder than either of us expected! But the views of the water and coastline were spectacular.

 

 

 

It was a pretty warm day, so after catching the train to head back into town, we hit the beach again. That was a theme of many of our days--a half-day trip of exploring followed by an afternoon of cooling off and resting our legs at the beach.

Monaco

I managed to check off another country on this trip--Monaco! Home of the Monte Carlo casino, Monaco is a teeny tiny country just a 30-minute (or so) train from Nice and so is perfect for a day trip.

 

The Monte Carlo casino at a distance.

There was a beautiful green space and garden as you walked from the main street to the Monte Carlo.

The casino itself was quite beautiful inside and it felt like an art museum that hosts events rather than a casino with art on the walls. It has tours each morning before the gambling ensues, so we got our tickets and our little audio guide and walked around.

The foyer of the casino.

There were a lot of signs admonishing people to not take pictures inside the casino, and I did not want to have a sticky situation in a foreign language with casino security... so even though a ton of other folks were taking photos and video, I refrained. But needless to say, the artwork was really breathtaking. The casino has these huge panels of scenes from different parts of daily life that really should be in a museum. And even the bars throughout the casino floor have mosaic artwork decorating their set-up.

After checking out the casino, we went off into the rest of Monaco. We ventured into the historic part of Monaco up on the hillside with spectacular views of the water and city.

 

The old town also holds the palace and a lot of cute, tight winding roads that are easy to wander and get lost in. (Speaking from personal experience...)

 

Monaco had yachts and fancy cars and high-end shopping (think Madison Avenue in NYC), but at the end of the day, I was more than happy to go back to our little spot on the beach and watch the sunset.

*    *    *

And, of course, throughout our time we made sure to sample un peu of the local fare (or a lot of it, as it were...) The wine is cheap and incredible, the seafood is delish, the boulangerie and patisserie game is on-point, and there are too many glace flavors to choose from.

 

The daily pan au chocolate is one of the things I have been missing the most. The French know breakfast.

Our last morning in Nice was definitely a bummer. Neither of us was quite ready to leave because we really loved being there. We could have done at least one more day trip during our time in Nice, but we both enjoyed the town so much that we didn't really see a reason to go somewhere else or to another nice beach if we were happy where we were.

Before catching our train out, we did two important things: 1) we went to a local English book store to buy more beach reads (we had exhausted our supplies already);

and 2) we went to the beach to just sit and chill for a few minutes, soaking in the last of Nice before we caught our train to Hyeres.

Besos,

Tina the Exploradora

The French Rivera is Nice! (Preview)

Hola todos, and bonjour, mes amis!

After last year's Italy adventure, I truly intended to take a break from international travel. I promise that I did... but when work vacation time is "use it or lose it" and I have a lot to use, a longer flight and a foreign language just scream my name. The deal-sweetener was that my mom wanted to join in on whatever adventure was brewing. So when the ideas started coming together, who was I to say no to beaches, croissants, and incredible wine?

Thus, our girls' trip to the southern coast of France, often called the French Riviera, was all but inevitable.

 

For just under two weeks, I swapped traffic horns for the crash of waves, my daily commute for new boulangeries, and the City that Never Sleeps for sleeping on the beach. Starting in Nice (pronounced "neese"), popping through a few coastal towns, and finishing in Marseille, there was plenty of sun, history, and pain au chocolat to go around. And I got to do it all with my favorite gal pal by my side.

 (*Spoiler alter*: We had a fabulous time.)

Check back over the next few weeks for some pics and the highlights of our trip!

Besos,

Tina the Exploradora

Pasta & the Pope: Rome (Days 17-21)

Hola todos,

I'm finally getting around to updating this with my final week in Rome. I checked off a lot of churches (and when I say "a lot", I am warning you... it was a lot) and sights and got enough steps in to last, well, at least a few plates of pasta. Those last few days kinds of all blended together, so I’ve taken a semi-but-not-strictly chronological approach to this final week or so.

Here's what I saw:

Papal Basilica of Saint Mary Major

This basilica is huge and plopped right in the middle of some busy streets. It is fairly easy to get to, and you can see it coming a long way away.

The have daily prayers outside on the steps of the church that anyone can participate in.

 

As you can see from these pictures, the inside is absolutely stunning. The artwork, the gilding, the columns, and the use of natural light to amplify the beauty of the space were just incredible. One of my top churches this trip, for sure.

 

Coliseum

I saw the Coliseum both during the day and at night, and the verdict is in: dusk is her golden hour. It was beautiful to see it up-lit, and I managed to see it this way several times over these last few days.

 

I had heard that the regular daytime tour of the Coliseum was mediocre, so I was happy just to see it from the outside and not go in. I also walked around much of the surrounding neighborhood, getting to see calm of dusk turn into the vibrancy of nightlife in this district.

Basilica of San Giovanni in Laterano

Next up: the Basilica of St. John Lateran. Not all of the churches had security out front, but this one did: probably because it is the chair of the Bishop of Rome (aka the Pope, but not in his role as Holy Father but in his role as Bishop).

I walked around, looking at the ornate ceiling and beautiful sculptures--and I accidentally crashed a mass in Hungarian.

 

Basilica of San Clemente

 

This basilica was one of the simpler churches that I visited (which is all relative--look at that ceiling!). Its simplicity was an effect of its age: the current basilica that we can see, built in 1100, is on top of a basilica from the 300s that served as an early church. As you can see from the scaffolding in the picture, it is getting some work done.

Basilica of St. Peter in Chains

This church was most impressive not because of its architecture, ceiling, or murals, but because of what it contains: the chains that held Peter the apostle when he was a prisoner in Rome. This church is otherwise a bit off the beaten path and not in an area that I would have gone to--so I would never have stumbled across it if I didn't have my pre-researched list.

 

The Spanish Steps

So, I know the Spanish steps are I supposed to be amazing. But… I found them underwhelming. Maybe it was the lack of flowers, or the too-many tourists. But definitely a “skip” in my tour book.

The view from the top is pretty, though:

The church and obelisk at the top of the Spanish Steps.

Views of the city from the top of the Spanish Steps.

I did get some local pane and formaggio, though, and saw ton a bench to people watch! Nearby is the upscale shopping district with lots of high-end apparel and accessory stores, so there were lots of different kinds of folks to observe.

Santa Maria degli Angeli

The front looked like it was built into a wall of rock.

This was easily the biggest church I have ever been in. There were several different chapels with frescoes and gigantic marble columns. It kind of felt like you were in a huge cavern that had been beautifully decorated.

 

 

Borghese Gallery

I hit another museum on the list: the Borghese Gallery. I did a self-guided tour (with a company linked here!) and roamed around for a few hours.  There was a lot of early Roman art (many of the sculptures had restored noses, chins, and hands that hadn't withstood the test of time) and an entire room of Caravaggio works.

This was one of my favorite sculptures of the trip--a Bernini that seems to flow in a spiral and has such intricate detail from each angle that you view it.

Look at the draped and folded fabric on this one--such intricate detail!

Even the tiled floors were art.

 

The gardens on the museum's grounds were worth a visit, too. Combined with the cool, cloudy weather, the garden was a perfect place to stroll around a bit.

St. Peter's Square (and Pope Francis!)

Although my biggest regret is that I wasn’t able to get to St. Peter’s Basilica, I did get to go to a mass and canonization in St. Peter’s Square. I was worried that I wouldn’t be allowed to attend because some websites talked about needing tickets to reserve a spot. But I woke up early to get there right as the gates opened (I think around 7 in the morning!) in the hopes of being able to take a remaining seat, if there were any. When I got there, ai just went through security and was ushered to a seat—no ticket needed!

St. Peter's Square, about as empty as it ever is.

The mass didn’t start for a few hours, so it was kind of a long wait. But I had strategically dehydrated and there was a nice couple from South America next to me who I chatted with a bit, and the time passed just fine.

  

Looking back now, a really cool part of the whole experience was that I got to see Pope Francis before he passed.

After the canonization mass, I had lunch at a local pasta place serving up big bowls of pasta for cheap. I was so hungry at that point that I considered just sitting on the sidewalk nearby to scarf down my food! But I found a shaded bench not too far away, so I holed up there for my lunch feast.

 

I spent a bit of time walking around the neighborhood just outside of the Vatican, checking out the shops and streets. But I had to get back into another neighborhood of Rome before too long for my dinner—a food tour in the trendy Trastavere neighborhood.

Claudio, our tour guide, gave us a great history of Rome through food as we walked through some of the streets and got both our brains and our bodies nourished. I tried a Porchetta sandwich, suppli, Roman-style pizza (including an interesting potato pizza slice), maritozzi, and of course gelato.

The Trastavere Bridge was built in 1475 over the Tiber River. At night, the view on the bridge is beautiful.

Capuchin Church and Crypt

Somewhat hidden and off the tourist-y path is a Capuchin church. (The Capuchins are a religious order--their name is the origin of the term cappuccino!  Cappuccinos are supposed to be the same color brown as a Capuchin's habit.) But underneath the church is something even cooler--a crypt.

The museum attached to the church and crypt had one of the best audio tours of the whole trip (a niche opinion, I recognize, but one I think I am qualified to hold at this point!) and it came included in the museum entrance ticket.

The museum walked through the history of the Capuchin Order with beautiful art and relics. 

But the real attraction was the crypt underneath, containing the bones of around 3,700 Capuchin monks decoratively arranged.  Leaning into the concept of momento mori (to remember or think on one's death for proper perspective about one's life), the crypt was part beautiful, part haunting, and totally metal.

Pasta Making Class

This was a bit unusual for me. I don't usually do classes during my trips--I'm more of a walk-and-talk tour kind of gal. But I had enough time to just chill in Rome that I figured it might be a fun (and informative!) experience.  There was a young family from France, a multi-generational girls' trip from Georgia (the state), and a honeymooning couple, and we all got to know each other while we rolled dough and shaped pasta. At the end, the class shared a meal of our hard work.  It was a lot of fun!

 

 

Deliziosa! (Great Italian wine and a limoncello shot at the end included, of course!)

The Vatican Museums and the Sistine Chapel

Although St. Peter's didn't get crossed off the list, I was able to snag tickets to visit the Vatican's museum, which concludes in the Sistine Chapel. I listened to the Rick Steves podcast/audio tour for each (free and informative!) and was blown away by the collection. Someone else I had met had warned me that I needed to pace myself through the Vatican Museums so that I wasn't burnt out and exhausted by the time I got to the Sistine Chapel. That was good advice and I can see how, if I had stopped to see every little thing in the museum, I would have been *over it* by the time I got to the end. (The podcast/tour was about an hour for each segment, and that turned out to be just about right, I think.)

 

Incredible views all around: views up on the ceiling of the Vatican Museums (top) and a view of Italy from inside the Vatican itself (bottom).

 

The Vatican Museum holds true to its name--it's really a museum!  The Apollo on the left was made in 500 BC (!!) and unearthed during the Renaissance.

This is L'acquan (don't spell check me), a statue that was unearthed while Michelangelo was on the scene. When discovered, the statue was missing its arm. Michelangelo looked at the pose and musculature and reconstructed the statue with the bent arm, against the inclinations of everyone else in the art world. Apparently they later found the original arm to the statue--and he was right.

The beautifully decorated floors are also artworks themselves! This one is 1700 years old (not a typo), which my mind cannot even comprehend.

 

And that is just a tiny fraction of the first 15 minutes or so. There are tapestries and murals, the Pope's private apartments (decorated by Rafael before he was a renowned artist), and, of course, the Sistine Chapel.

There is no photography allowed in the Sistine Chapel itself, but Michelangelo's full-send ceiling (and The Last Judgment on one of the walls) was an incredible sight to behold. There are 5900 square feet of paintings (most of which are from Michelangelo's own hand) and the thoughtful details were incredible.

One of the most famous images from the Sistine Chapel is God reaching out and touching the finger of Adam. Looking at the image in isolation doesn't convey the full story of how it is positioned on the ceiling of the Chapel. The iconic image is in the center, but the two fingers don't meet in the middle. Rather, God's hand extends out past center to Adam--a beautifully moving depiction of how God fills the gap in what we lack.

 

Near the Vatican, there is a stunning rooftop restaurant and bar. Pricey though it is, I grabbed brunch there as a final hurrah. The view was totally worth it!

My last evening in Rome, I grabbed dinner at a restaurant right across the street from my hotel. The portions were huge, the prices were great, and the food was even better.

As I packed up, I jettisoned almost-empty toiletries and clothing that was ready to be retired. I had very limited luggage space and lots of things that I had picked up over the last three weeks--and y'all know that I was not paying for a checked bag.

The face of a woman with mixed feelings: sad to leave, happy to be returning to the land of air conditioning and ice water, and exhausted by the weight of 3 pounds of souvenir pasta.

Would I change anything about my time in Roma?

If I ever get back to Rome, I would love to stay closer to the Centro Storico or Trastavere districts--they're vibrant and closer to the sites I wanted to visit. And, of course, St. Peter's Basilica has to be on the top of the list. Rome wasn't my favorite city of the trip (I'm looking at you, Siena and Florence!) but it is perfect for history buffs (whether ancient, medieval, or modern) or as a brief landing spot to get to the rest of Italy.

And with that, my time in Italy concluded. It was a once-in-a-lifetime whirlwind, and I still sometimes cannot believe that I went. Thanks for coming along with me, and let me know if you ever go!

Besos, amore, y hasta luego,

Tina the Exploradora

(Final) cumulative steps: 469,145