Day 4 – Rocks in the French Riviera

Here are just a handful of pictures from our last day in France!

So much sadness that this was our last day! We woke up pretty late and decided to take one last walk around Nice and then we headed over to the beach! The night before I had learned to skip rocks so we spent longer than I’d care to admit playing with rocks and trying for that ultimate triple hop skip.

The beach had rock in lieu of sand so after I passed out I woke up with rock branding on my leg. Pretty cool if ya ask me.

 

I also decided to forget my sunscreen so the whole weekend was a blur of red and white. I’m hardcore Irish and my skin behaved accordingly. I had the worst burn on my back after I fell asleep on the beach and I’m still peeling, a week later.

Alison caught an earlier flight out of Nice because she had an exam she needed to study for.. which ended up being the best decision because our flight was delayed for 3+ hours!

Going to Nice was one of the most exciting travel adventures for me thus far – we planned the trip, paid, and then got to go on it! It was so rewarding to see everything come together. I think my biggest take away from this whole trip was that when things look like they aren’t going according to plan (a train strike, a rainy day, a flight delay) you just need to improvise and move on. It was the best possible trip and all the “accidents” that could have made the experience less enjoyable were easily overlooked because ya know. We were in France.

Day 3 – Aussies and Arkansas

Day 3 was filled with exploring, art, and strangers!

So once again we found ourselves splitting off into groups of 2 on this trip! Michelle and I are the sleep inners so we got a bit of a late start on day 3 and headed out at around 10. We went out into the streets hoping to find something going on that day and for me to be able to buy a beautiful tapestry I had spotted the day before.. Only one of those happened.

We found a book festival! Anyone who knows me knows that I love reading and despite the fact that the books were obviously all in French it was so cute to see how the festival was set up. I forget the name of the the whole project but the festival had 3 locations around Nice and Michelle and I ended up finding all of them which was really exciting. My favorite of the three locations was the children’s section. There were tons of kids running around and the illustrations in the books were beautiful. It was the perfect way to start off our morning!

 

After looking around in the morning at the festival and wandering around we stopped by the flower market to pick up some fruit and we found the third festival location. We spotted an english book pile and I purchased the book shown above. I think I’ve mentioned before but I love those feel good, inspiring books and this book has daily thoughts and reflections on how to live life positively. I loved that it was secondhand and that I was able to bring it back from France! So nifty.

Then we met up with the other two girls, Alison and Uyen and WE FOUND MEAT. Seriously our biggest struggle in Rome is finding meat. At the airport on our way to France when we stopped at the McDonalds I felt like i was at the US Embassy. I really, really miss my hamburgers. We all thoroughly enjoyed our lunchtime because it was the first time in a long time I got to eat some protein!

  

Just look how excited we are with all that burger and fries.

After lunch we found a flea market that only sets up in the big plaza once a month! There was a huge collection of random finds and antiques and I loved looking at all the different shops set up. It started to drizzle so we went inside a huge contemporary art museum that was free to the public!

 

I have never been huge on contemporary art, mainly because I find it really hard to understand. To me the paintings and the sculptures are much easier to admire and think about because its recognizable and you know somewhat how to evaluate what you’re looking at.. not so much with contemporary art. The minute I walked in I was immediately overstimulated. There was so much color, texture, and size that I didn’t even know how to tackle the first room.

But about 5 minutes in Michelle and I started to verbally analyze every piece we looked at which made looking at the art that much easier and enjoyable.

Sorry about the shadow in the top left picture but
1. It’s in English. I about threw a party.
2. I love what it says. (“AIDS. You can’t catch it holding hands.) And I really enjoyed everything else the artist painted and created.

The other two guys up there were just weird and fun to look at. Again, I had no clue what I was looking at but boy was it fun to make up some crazy guesses with my friends.

Alison and Uyen found the jackpot! At the top of the Museum (gallery?) there was a door to get outside where you had a bird’s eye view of Nice. It was pretty gloomy out, unfortunately, but it didn’t take away too much from the phenomenal scenery. We stood out there for about 20 minutes just taking it all in. Nice is by far one of the most beautiful places I’ve ever been privileged to visit.

So I’ve never stayed in a hostel before. I definitely envisioned a hole in the wall, dirty, unhygienic atmosphere going into this whole situation. Luckily my low standard set me up for a big ball of happiness when I went into a nice little dorm room with comfortable beds and a bathroom that accommodated for 8, which ended up not being too bad.

Hands down one of my favorite experiences of the entire trip was meeting people from all over the place. Our hostel in particular was packed. Remember those train strikes I mentioned earlier? Well the local trains would pick up again at 3 pm but the long distance ones were completely shut down. People were quite literally stuck in Nice so the hostel was overflowing with travelers who hadn’t intended on staying and new travelers who were just arriving. So the common room and kitchen was standing room only.

When we got back a few of us ended up making spaghetti in the kitchen and while we were downstairs we got to meet some guys from Sweden who told us it was quite typical to graduate from high school and then pick up any go travel until they figured out their college situation and wait until they were admitted. We met some Canadians who were out backpacking for the summer. We met a really cool girl from California who has a job lined up when she gets back but is traveling in between school and work. We talked to all kinds of people from all types of backgrounds. My favorite thing? Not a single person came into it stressed about what was waiting for them on the other side. We met people who had already been working and took time off or who were in between jobs. We met students. We met graduates who were trying to figure out what they wanted to do. We met people from all different walks of life and I just really loved hearing people doing something that’s commonly referred to as a “pipe dream” or impossible.

That night Michelle and I ended up going to the beach with two of the guys who were staying in our room. A 19 year old from Australia and a stand up comedian from Arkansas. Mom, before you freak out the kid from Australia was reading a Dan Brown novel for most of the day and the guy from Arkansas has a website.. So they check out. It was so fun. We had some good conversation about education and policies in Australia that I never really knew about and we talked with the guy from Arkansas about his travel plans and what it’s like to work in such a tough industry.

All together it was an awesome experience and I look forward to more trips that enable me to meet awesome people and make these kinds of memories.

Day 1 – Baguettes and Brie

An advance warning of the next 4 posts .. There will be a lot of pictures.

  

I think I’m always a little nervous that something is bound to go wrong in any given airport, bus, or any type of public transportation.. But we made it! It was so fun to sit around with 3 girls I met just 2 weeks ago and realize we had effectively made our way to Nice, France. It was a #proud moment. I think the saddest part of getting there was watching Easy Jet ruin the lives of people who didn’t realize that “one bag” meant. one. bag. All the poor women with purses and men with briefcases never stood a chance. Anyways we arrived and since our hostel had messed up our room arrangement we immediately set out exploring our home for the next few days.

These are my gal pals above who made this trip as wonderful as it could possibly be! The top left is a picture of a beautiful park smack dab in the middle of Nice and every single time we walked past the park throughout the week we would see a million children playing and adults picnicking on the grass.

  

The streets were something straight out of a movie set. There were tons of little shops and the buildings were squeezed so tightly together you could barely fit three people in side by side. You’ll notice the BATHTUB on the top left. The hostel that had previously screwed up our room situation generously upgraded us to two private rooms and we got our own bathtub.. it was basically like a Four Seasons at that point.

 

We made our way to the beach and OH MY GOSH the French Riviera! It was stunning. I have more pictures from the beach in the posts to come but this was our first glimpse of the colorful coastline and we spent most of our evenings out there just sitting on the rocks and admiring the view.

    

This was a pretty central plaza to everything. In it you could find street performers, children, dancers, and more backpackers than I have seen in my entire life.

  

To wind down our day the girls and I grabbed a bottle of wine, 4 baguettes, and a slab of brie. It was perfect. We started off in the giant park we had visited earlier and then made our way over to the beach where we watched to moon come up and tried to wrap our minds around the fact that we were in one of the most stunning places in the world.

Day 1 was a complete success! It was a ton of exploring, a lot of negotiating with the hostel, and I spent the entire day admiring the charm of this beach town. I would need all the rest I could get because day 2 was filled with sharks and hikes!