Visitors from Angers

It’s been a while since Joel and Francoise have been able to visit us, so it’s great that they could finally make it to the Cote d’Azur to enjoy a bit of southern sunshine. I and Mathilde had been doing a fair bit of scouting to check for suitable hotels for Joel. After checking out a few options, we ended up with a nice, modern hotel on the seaside, not far from the Cros de Cagnes (where I do my weekly sailing sessions on Saturdays). For us it ticked all the boxes, apart from the missing sea view. Herquise also came along for the visit, and spent the week at our flat.

After a calm Sunday spent checking out Cagnes, we decided to head out to Cannes on Monday. It was a day off for me, so I was also able to join; as where my parents, who were also keen to meet up with Joel and Francoise. We had a bit of a lie-in on in the morning, so only made it into Cannes for lunchtime. We met up with parents in the old port of Cannes, and headed straight to a snack bar to stock up on supplies for our improvised picnic lunch. A few sandwiches and Finnish Easter eggs later, we headed out to explore Cannes. We started at the Palais de Festivales (where else?), and had a look at the famous film star handprints, and then made our way to the Croisette.

The Croisette needs no introduction, of course. It’s the 2km avenue, covering the Cannes seaside, known for the flashy hotels (like the Carlton) and glitzy shops (there’s even a Vertu shop there…). And it was surely a perfect day for a walk on the Croisette –we were blessed with a blue sky and glorious sunshine on this particular occasion. Good fun checking out the “Riviera couples” (normally the male is old, rich and wears dark shades. The female is young, blonde (fake, naturally) and pretty. Without gong into clichés of course!) who had made an appearance in impressive numbers (build-up for the Cannes film festival, I suppose, which is in a few weeks). We even treated ourselves to the first ice cream of the season ;-). A great and relaxing way to spend a nice spring afternoon!

I was, unfortunately, working for the rest of the week. But I was able to join the others for the odd afternoon coffee / lunch. That’s what’s great about living in this part of the world, the possibility to have a nice coffee by the seaside after getting out of the office, a real luxury… In the evenings we had good fun with Herquise as well in our flat, mostly playing “Buzz’s pop quiz” on my PS2. I and Herquise didn’t have much of a say against Mathilde’s encyclopaedic music knowledge, so ‘twas a bit of a humiliation for us (personally, I definately prefer the movie quiz... ;-) ). I also had great fun “helping Herquise out” with her PSP game (just an excuse to have a go myself, of course!)




On Wednesday evening my parents had kindly invited us over for dinner to their swishy flat in Antibes. After a typically festive aperitif (champagne, what else?), we dug into the food. My dad had made us some absolutely delicious filet mignon. The meat quite simply melted in my mouth (I even felt oblidged to have some broccoli, which was of course present as a side dish, as always… Not my favourite veg…). And to finish off, a raspberry cake. So we went home with our appetites well sated.

As a grand finale for the week, we met up at Joel’s and Francoise’s hotel on Friday. We first had a somewhat disappointing “aperitif” (for my part, I had what’s probably the worst, but certainly not the cheapest milkshake ever…) at the hotel bar. The Aéva is a good hotel, and we quite enjoy having a coffee on their roof-top balcony, but the outdoors bar was a bit of a disappointment. For dinner, we had a couple (well, 4 or 5 in the end, I think…) of very tasty pizzas from a nearby take-away restaurant.

All in all, we had a really great week. I hope Francoise and Joel can make it again, soon!