This weekend, I was supposed to have two old friends over visiting. Ed from London, and Andy from Basel. We used to study together at ‘ole Heriot-Watt university at Edinburgh (I visited Andy in Japan about two years ago, and see a fair bit of Ed in London). Unfortunately, Ed made a bit of a mistake with his flights (booked them for the wrong month…) and didn’t show up in the end. Andy arrived on schedule, though.
Due to our ongoing bathroom renovation, we decided to stay at my parents’ place in Antibes. After dropping off our things, we made our way into Antibes. After a short walk around the old town, we found a nice little tourist-trap restaurant at Place National for dinner. After we’d sated our apetites, we made our way to the Absinth bar – a real Antibes institution (we were also joined by Hyem, a colleague of Mathilde’s, at this point). It’s a great place – both for drinking absinth and trying out hats. The picture gives you an idea ;-). A bit pricey though – and the 3-drink limit is a bit disappointing (mind you, not sure whether it’s a maximum or minimum limit?).
We were a bit lazy the next day (absinth effect?), but did eventually get up and headed East, towards the Italian border. We stopped at Menton, just on the French side of the border. In spite of the rather cloudy weather, we decided to go for a swim, after which we explored the old town for a bit. I like Menton – it’s definitely got a rather charming Italian touch to it. After having some nice Italian pasta for lunch, we carried on towards Nice.
Our next stop was Nice – naturally mandatory for anybody visiting the Cote d’Azur. We parked near the old town, and decided to start by visiting the museum of modern art. Not so much for the art (although there is some cool stuff there) – more for the nice views over Nice the roof-top terrace offers. After that we explored the old town a bit, and stopped at Fenocchio’s (a real Nicois institution) for a gelato. We dined at “Black Cat, White Cat” (named after the Kustorica film), a real gem of a restaurant right in the centre of the old town. The place is ran by the old crew from Jouni’s (a Michelin-starred restaurant named after its Finnish chef), and later Le Reserve. The food was really delicious, and the place really cool and what’s best of all, the prices were pretty reasonable.
On Sunday, the plan was to show Andy some of the small, cute mountain villages the Cote d’Azur is blessed with. So we headed towards Gourdon. Unfortunately, the weather was far from ideal for such an expedition – in fact it started raining cats and dogs just as we got to Gourdon. Thankfully, we managed to rush to one of the two restaurants in the village, for a rather nice lunch. Unfortunately, we didn’t get the opportunity to enjoy the panorama over the Loup Valley, for which Gourdon is famous…
After dropping off Mathilde in Cagnes (she had some work to do for Monday), we headed on to Monaco – another place where most people seem to want to visit. We started with the main sight – the Casino. Unfortunately Andy didn’t bring his passport so we couldn’t actually pay 20 euros to have the honour of losing yet more money inside… So, we lost our money in the nearby “mini-casino” in the Café de Paris instead. At least we got to enjoy the sight of a few Ferraris ;-).
After taking in the usual other Monaco sights (the rather disappointing Palace, the impressive Museum of Oceanography, the yachts in the harbour), we made our way for dinner to Stars ‘n Bars, in the harbour. It’s a kind of classy version of Planet Hollywood, with various memorabilia from motor sports (we were seated next to vitrines with Markku Alen’s and Ari Vatanen’s driving overalls – wicked!). Anyway, I like Stars ‘n Bars, a bit of a touch of Americana on the Cote d’Azur. And the hamburgers aren’t too bad – if a bit pricey.
On Monday, it was time for a bit of exercise. Since Andy is into outdoors stuff, we decided to head out to the Park Natioanl de Mercantour for a bit of serious hiking. We opted for a walk around the Madone de Fenestre. There is a small church at the hamlet where the walk starts (in honour of the Madone – there is a kind of hole in the mountain next to the church which apparently looks like a window, beneath which this Madonna did her miraculous stuff, or something along those lines…).
It was quite a fantastic hike, taking us up though some very nice landscape up to a small lake, from where we headed up towards a nice mountain pass right on the border of Italy, from where we were greeted by some rather stunning scenery on both sides of the border. From there, we made our way back down to the Madone and the nearby refuge, where we stopped by for a beer and blueberry pie (the two go well together, honestly!). What was great about this hike, apart from the great scenery, was the amount of wild-life we saw. We saw loads of Marmots, and even a couple of Chamois (a graceful goat-antelope, which are quite numerous in the Mercantour). All in all, a pretty fantastic way to spend a few hours...
We finished off the day with dinner in Antibes with Naim, who joined us (him and Andy, both being rather dedicated cyclists, had plenty to chat about). That brought an end to Andy’s visit… Great to see him again, next time in Basel perhaps?
Due to our ongoing bathroom renovation, we decided to stay at my parents’ place in Antibes. After dropping off our things, we made our way into Antibes. After a short walk around the old town, we found a nice little tourist-trap restaurant at Place National for dinner. After we’d sated our apetites, we made our way to the Absinth bar – a real Antibes institution (we were also joined by Hyem, a colleague of Mathilde’s, at this point). It’s a great place – both for drinking absinth and trying out hats. The picture gives you an idea ;-). A bit pricey though – and the 3-drink limit is a bit disappointing (mind you, not sure whether it’s a maximum or minimum limit?).
We were a bit lazy the next day (absinth effect?), but did eventually get up and headed East, towards the Italian border. We stopped at Menton, just on the French side of the border. In spite of the rather cloudy weather, we decided to go for a swim, after which we explored the old town for a bit. I like Menton – it’s definitely got a rather charming Italian touch to it. After having some nice Italian pasta for lunch, we carried on towards Nice. Our next stop was Nice – naturally mandatory for anybody visiting the Cote d’Azur. We parked near the old town, and decided to start by visiting the museum of modern art. Not so much for the art (although there is some cool stuff there) – more for the nice views over Nice the roof-top terrace offers. After that we explored the old town a bit, and stopped at Fenocchio’s (a real Nicois institution) for a gelato. We dined at “Black Cat, White Cat” (named after the Kustorica film), a real gem of a restaurant right in the centre of the old town. The place is ran by the old crew from Jouni’s (a Michelin-starred restaurant named after its Finnish chef), and later Le Reserve. The food was really delicious, and the place really cool and what’s best of all, the prices were pretty reasonable.
On Sunday, the plan was to show Andy some of the small, cute mountain villages the Cote d’Azur is blessed with. So we headed towards Gourdon. Unfortunately, the weather was far from ideal for such an expedition – in fact it started raining cats and dogs just as we got to Gourdon. Thankfully, we managed to rush to one of the two restaurants in the village, for a rather nice lunch. Unfortunately, we didn’t get the opportunity to enjoy the panorama over the Loup Valley, for which Gourdon is famous…
After dropping off Mathilde in Cagnes (she had some work to do for Monday), we headed on to Monaco – another place where most people seem to want to visit. We started with the main sight – the Casino. Unfortunately Andy didn’t bring his passport so we couldn’t actually pay 20 euros to have the honour of losing yet more money inside… So, we lost our money in the nearby “mini-casino” in the Café de Paris instead. At least we got to enjoy the sight of a few Ferraris ;-).
After taking in the usual other Monaco sights (the rather disappointing Palace, the impressive Museum of Oceanography, the yachts in the harbour), we made our way for dinner to Stars ‘n Bars, in the harbour. It’s a kind of classy version of Planet Hollywood, with various memorabilia from motor sports (we were seated next to vitrines with Markku Alen’s and Ari Vatanen’s driving overalls – wicked!). Anyway, I like Stars ‘n Bars, a bit of a touch of Americana on the Cote d’Azur. And the hamburgers aren’t too bad – if a bit pricey.
On Monday, it was time for a bit of exercise. Since Andy is into outdoors stuff, we decided to head out to the Park Natioanl de Mercantour for a bit of serious hiking. We opted for a walk around the Madone de Fenestre. There is a small church at the hamlet where the walk starts (in honour of the Madone – there is a kind of hole in the mountain next to the church which apparently looks like a window, beneath which this Madonna did her miraculous stuff, or something along those lines…).
It was quite a fantastic hike, taking us up though some very nice landscape up to a small lake, from where we headed up towards a nice mountain pass right on the border of Italy, from where we were greeted by some rather stunning scenery on both sides of the border. From there, we made our way back down to the Madone and the nearby refuge, where we stopped by for a beer and blueberry pie (the two go well together, honestly!). What was great about this hike, apart from the great scenery, was the amount of wild-life we saw. We saw loads of Marmots, and even a couple of Chamois (a graceful goat-antelope, which are quite numerous in the Mercantour). All in all, a pretty fantastic way to spend a few hours...We finished off the day with dinner in Antibes with Naim, who joined us (him and Andy, both being rather dedicated cyclists, had plenty to chat about). That brought an end to Andy’s visit… Great to see him again, next time in Basel perhaps?
Posts
No comments:
Post a Comment