Saturday, April 26, 2025

Cap Ferrat

On April 22nd we took bus #15 over to Cap Ferrat, a small peninsula hanging down into the Mediterranean between Nice and Monaco, to have a look around and do a scenic hike.

Arrival in Saint Jean Cap Ferrat


Will deliver to your yacht or villa

Bench seating

Looking back to the mainland and the middle corniche

Arrival of nice Canadian tourists and edudiants

Best sculpture ever so far of Churchill, who frequented this area in the 30s

He took up painting as a distraction from the catastrophe of the Dardanelles in WWI and became quite accomplished

The day's photo shoot


Our hike

With the Canadians at an overlook

Typically rugged French trail (note trees)

With natural, historical interpretive signage every few meters

Quarrying in the area for the Casino and other monumental buildings in Monaco

Family campground on Cap Ferrat in the 50s

Aways room for a few more villas (construction cranes)

Field trip

Fly-over country (though Nice is France's 2nd busiest airport after Paris)



At the shrine of St. Hospice

As large as some of the Buddha statues in Thailand

Tower thereabouts...something about the chevaliers of Malta...

Interesting seating at a resto back in town


Scenes From Younger Nice

Sights from several walks on the west side of town...

Interesting hotel hotel

Interesting shopping center right by...

The main train station (entrance); unlike many places, in a nice part of town

On a given block you're apt to see art deco, nouveau, beaux arts,
brutalist...anything...except the very old

Brick art deco PTT building; "postal, telephone, telegraph"; in days
of yore, when we began traveling in Europe, you had to go to the PTT
to do an ET (call home)

Three graces...

One of many such

Not so many like this; we theorize it may have been the European
headquarters for Airstream trailers

Deco


Note painting at top

Street scene

Pretty typical deco near city center

One man's messages on the beach along the Promenade

A typically French thing is to place large educational exhibits
in public places...on topics historical, cultural, scientific...

This one scientific...with due credit to the researchers...


Ocean temperatures depicting a warming planet

A melting pole 

Colonial past...

Peeking out from a 6-8 story building

Murals and such everywhere


The old Gare Sud, now the site of a large market and food hall

Place Charles de Gaulle

Le Chamber de Commerce

Almost any bare wall gets a mural or maybe trompe l'oiel windows


Friday, April 25, 2025

Cimiez

Another day, in clearing weather, we walked up (!) the Boulevard Cimiez to see the Nice of the latter half of the 19th century, but also that of the first centuries CE. Beach bathing did not really become a thing until nearly the end of the 19th century. Hence, wintering in Nice was a thing somewhat earlier, for the royals and the aristos, and thus the grand hotels were built up the hill, not by the beach. For the Romans, Nice was initially an army staging area, but then grew to be a town of minor importance. Thus the coliseum.

Hotel Majestic...once one of Nice's greatest, now mostly apartments

Leading to the Chagall Museum, which we saw in 2010...meh

A project Mini; can't believe it hasn't been towed away

Among the many grand villas







Monument to Queen Victoria, who wintered here in the 1890s

The villes of the Cote d'Azur with their offerings

The Hotel Regina Excelsior, built in her honor, and where she stayed,
as Lady Balmoral, several seasons

Moving right along now, in the 3rd century Roman coliseum, where
men are still doing what men must do...petanque!

Not one of your more impressive Roman ruins



We did the Matisse museum in 2010; nous y sommes alles, nous l'avons fait;
it was closed for renovation anyway