Nice / Monaco / Cannes
Because we arrived early on the train, our hotel wasn't ready yet. With five hours to kill, we went looking for a lengthy breakfast. We found a restaurant on the beach and realized we didn't know a word of French. Even numbers were confusing. Our waiter spoke English. This was another new experience. In Spain, it usually wasn't even worth asking.
The next morning, we went for crepes in Nice. The waitress was exceedingly kind, acting out all of the menu items for us, checking on us frequently and generally being motherly. Having just learned "vouz et tre gentil" (you are very kind), Eric recited, and she went nuts. She was so thrilled she leapt about the restaurant. She said our French was marvelous. Then, she leaned over very conspiratorially and whispered, as if it explained something, "Je ne francais" (I am not French). She was Romanian, or a gypsy. One or the other. Either way, she wasn't French. And yes, it did explain a lot.
Monaco, just 15 minutes up the train tracks from Nice, is famed for its grand prix and casino, so we went to the aquarium. It was well worth the price of admission ($11, since Eric forgot our ISIC cards). They had enormous lobsters, a leafy sea dragon and a decent shark tank. About the only thing it was missing was a big, Monterey Bay-style tank. It made up for this with an upstairs exhibit of specimens collected by the late Prince Albert, who was quite the explorer. A huge whale hung from the ceiling in the middle, while hundreds of bleached, unhappy fish hung out in formaldehyde jars around the sides.
The aquarium hung drastically off the side of a picture-perfect white cliff. Like all of Monaco, it sparkled with clean, imperial beauty. Gardens and palaces filled out very orderly, specific spaces over amazing blue water and sparkly white yachts.
The next day, we went to Cannes, 15 minutes down the train tracks from Nice, a beautiful city that was thoroughly unremarkable. We succeeded in getting sunburned and having a French woman confuse Eric with a beggar in the market. A woman sitting behind us on the beach, who was probably at least 80, was wearing a bright yellow thong, 10 pounds of makeup, and nothing else.
Almost all of Cannes was private beaches, owned by hotels, which distinguished their private beach by coloring their beach umbrellas differently than everyone else. The beach was an endless row of orderly umbrellas, with the same pattern, but some were blue and gold, while others were pink and white, or red and blue, or whatever. However they were decorated, they were packed so densely that they nearly obscured the sand.
On our last day, we ran into Hari's roommate Chris and his friend Nick at an Internet place which (thank God) had English keyboards. The tribulations of a French keyboard are too much: the "a" key is where the "w" is supposed to be, the "m" is moved up near the "p," the entire number row is moved to go with the shift key, and we still haven't found the apostrophe or @ symbol.
We had dinner with Chris, Nick and their tour group. Some ordered escargot. Some ordered the mussel dish. Eric had chef salad, which was probably one of the most awful things ever, and also had celery in it. Fortunately, Nick ate it. Hari ordered eggplant parmesan, which was probably the second most awful thing ever, and also was too cheesy. Fortunately, Nick ate it.
