Last fall, we decided
that we wanted to run a half-marathon somewhere in Europe. After browsing some
running sites on the internet, we found a good option: the annual Nice
semi-marathon. We decided to build a small trip around the race.
On a Wednesday evening,
we flew into Nice. The airport runway is right on the ocean, so the views from
the plane during the descent are pretty incredible.
We were pretty tired
from traveling, so we did some strolling through the town and enjoyed dinner
outside at an Italian restaurant. We didn’t stay out too late because we wanted
to be well-rested for our first day trip on Thursday. There are many interesting towns along the coast that are easily reachable from Nice via short train rides. We planned to visit a few over the following couple of days.
On Thursday morning,
we grabbed chocolate croissants in town (delicious!) before heading to the
train station for our first day trip: Cannes. It is a short (40 minute) train
ride from Nice. You might recognize the name of the town because it is the
location for the famous annual Cannes film festival. As such, we expected it to
be really fancy.
Maybe we set our
expectations too high, but we were not overly impressed. The town was very
quaint, the harbor picturesque, and there were many high-end luxury stores.
However, it seemed a bit run down. Perhaps we were just expecting too much.
Nevertheless, we enjoyed exploring the town. We walked through their open-air
market and split socca, which is a crepe-like pancake made from chickpeas. It
was delicious!
This is the large theater/convention center where the film festival is held. Note the red carpet!
Matt is obsessed with these trees! They are all over southern France.
Since the weather was absolutely gorgeous, we decided to enjoy a long lunch outside. Many restaurants in the French Riviera offer reasonable lunch menus where you pick a starter, a main course, and a dessert for a set price. We enjoyed burrata – a creamy, mild cheese similar to fresh mozzarella (but better!), a salmon entrée, and delicious desserts. The chocolate molten cake with ice cream was out of this world. We also split a bottle of Rosé wine from a local vineyard. It was the perfect lunch.
This is the large theater/convention center where the film festival is held. Note the red carpet!
Matt is obsessed with these trees! They are all over southern France.
Since the weather was absolutely gorgeous, we decided to enjoy a long lunch outside. Many restaurants in the French Riviera offer reasonable lunch menus where you pick a starter, a main course, and a dessert for a set price. We enjoyed burrata – a creamy, mild cheese similar to fresh mozzarella (but better!), a salmon entrée, and delicious desserts. The chocolate molten cake with ice cream was out of this world. We also split a bottle of Rosé wine from a local vineyard. It was the perfect lunch.
We explored a bit more
and then headed back to Nice. Since we had a large lunch, we just bought a
baguette and some cheese for dinner. We enjoyed it on a bench overlooking the
Mediterranean. A wonderful end to our first full day in the French Riviera!
