Nice, France - A Walk On The Beachfront And Nice's Old Town

We boarded our cruise ship in Barcelona, Spain.  Barcelona was amazing, by the way!  (Read about our visit here.)  We were happy we decided to spend two days there while we waited for the ship that would take us on a vacation we have been looking forward to for many years, a cruise around Europe.  Now, it was time to get on the ship and get excited for our first stop, Nice, France.

The first port, on our cruise itinerary, was actually described as Nice (Villefranche) France.  Villefrance was actually our port but it is a very small town so I guess since Nice was so easy to get to, and more well-known, the port was listed as Nice.  Our ship couldn't dock near land in Villefranche, though, so we started off our adventure in France with a tender ride to the shore.  

Monaco was also pretty easy to get to from Villefrance but since Nice is the largest city in the French Riviera and the closest major city to Villefrance, we decided that's where we would spend our day.  We walked 10 minutes through the cute town of Villefrance to get to the train station.  If we would have decided to go to Monaco, mostly to see the famous Monte Carlo Casino, we would have wound up at this same train station going east instead of west.

We found out that finding your way around a foreign country without knowing the language and not being able to figure out how to use Google Maps (yet!) was not an easy task.  Somehow, we did make it to Old Town though.  

We were going to follow the walk that Rick Steves describes in his book, Mediterranean Cruise Ports.  His walk starts at Place Massena but before we even got there we got off course when I spotted a macaron bakery.  I found out that although macarons I have eaten in America are delicious, they are not as good as they are in France!  They are completely opposite of France's, as a matter of fact.  France's macaron has a much thinner cookie and double the filling.  I am dreaming about going back one day to try every flavor.  I can't believe I only tried one when we were there!

After enjoying that delicious macaroon, we found Place Massena.  We knew we were there when we saw the checkerboard pavement.  I was excited about finding men sitting on top of high pedestals here.  They were not hard to find!

In this same plaza, we were to look for Apollo holding his beach towel.  We would have to walk past him to get into Old Town or Vieux Nice.

Just past this amazing fountain, we found Rue St. Francois de Paule.  This street took us to the heart of Vieux Nice and on this street were shops that I was looking forward to shopping in.  The first shop on Rick Steves walk that we wanted to shop in was Alziari olive oil shop.  This shop has been in operation since 1868.  We knew we wanted to to try their olives but didn't know that there would be so many choices.  It took awhile to make a choice.

La Couqueto was also on this street and is where we bought our santon.  Santons are handpainted clay figurines that are usually used at Christmastime in nativities.  We found a shepherd boy here that we used to decorate our home this Christmas.

Next to find on Rick Steves walk, and still on Rue St. Francois de Paule, was Nice's opera house.  The facade was as incredible as we read it would be.

I was really excited about the building directly across the street from the opera house.  According to what we read in Steves book, Patisserie Auer's was where Queen Victoria would shop for chocolate.  I would definitely have bought plenty of chocolate here but the store was closed!

The next sight on our walking tour was Cours Saleya, Nice's main market square.  The flowers that are sold here are the flowers that are used to make perfume.  I couldn't wait to get a whiff of them.

After spending some time at the market, we looked for the next street on our tour, Rue de la Poissonerie.  We were looking for Adam and Eve on our right as we turned onto this street.  We were to look up toward the first floor of the first building here to see them.  Well...we searched and we searched and never found them.  At first we were on the wrong street, but couldn't find them when we found the right street!  But we didn't miss the small church, Notre-Dame de l'Annonciation.  This church is the most popular church in Nice as it is dedicated to St. Rita.  She is the patron saint of desperate causes and desperate people and she has a special place in the hearts of the locals here.

From here we were to look for Rue Droite.   On this street we would find Eglise St-Jacques le Majeur.  It is a Catholic church and a Baroque style building.  The definition I found for Baroque is "richly decorated with many ornaments, stucco, false marble, cherubs and medallions."  It was definitely richly decorated and beautiful.

Place Rossetti was where our walking tour ended.  Here we found the gorgeous Cathedral of St. Reparate.

One last stop before we left Old Town and headed to the beach.  Fenocchios and our first taste of gelato!  Looks like we saved the best for last!  I think half the population of Nice was here enjoying the deliciousness! 

Before starting our second Rick Steves walking tour, we made a stop at Castle Hill.  We had a choice of walking up the hill, to get to an ancient fort and great view, or taking an elevator.  We took the elevator!  We were so glad we went a out of our way to stop here.  The view we were treated to was well worth it!

Rick Steves' Promenade Des Anglais walk was next on our "must-see in Nice" list.  We didn't see most of the sights on this walking tour as we ran out of time to.  We mostly just wanted to stroll along the beach anyway.  If we had time, we might have took a peek inside the elegant Hotel Negresco and maybe checked out the Massena Museum to have a look at Josephine's cape and tiara and Napoleon's desk mask!

What we did see was a beach like we've never seen before.  We are used to seeing sandy beaches so seeing one as rocky as this one was a very unusual, but very cool sight to see.  I also couldn't believe how comfortable the sunbathers looked laying on top of these rocks on their thin beach blankets!

It took awhile, but we did find the tiny bronze Statue of Liberty that Rick Steves mentions as a sight to see on this walk.

It was time to head back to Villefranche.  On our way back to the train station, we passed this interesting monument, which I didn't know at the time, was erected in 1896 to celebrate the centennial anniversary of Nice's annexation to France and...

this beautiful carousel.

We took one last picture in our port city, Villefranche, before boarding our cruise ship.  

One thing I wanted to do was to eat some French onion soup (see delicious recipe here) in France.  We looked all over but had no luck.  Do they eat it in France or is it like french fries that are not really French?  Well, anyway, lucky for me, the cruise ship had it on their dinner menu!

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Decorating With Vacation Memories

I can't believe that the vacation we waited so long for, our Mediterranean Cruise, is now just a memory.  But what a wonderful memory it is.  One we will never forget.  And just in case we do start to forget, we made sure we took plenty of pictures to jolt our memories.  Another memory jolter is the souvenirs we brought home with us.  

I brought home at least one souvenir from each country we visited.  A couple of the souvenirs were Christmas ornaments.  Some of my favorite souvenirs are the Christmas ornaments I've gotten over the years on special vacations.  We love reliving those vacations as we hang each ornament on our Christmas tree.

Sometimes I find other Christmas items that make me happy when I decorate my house at Christmastime.  This year, I found a santon that I knew would make me smile every time I decorated with it each Christmas.  

Before I left on vacation I researched the things I should seek out in each country to bring home.  In France, one of the items were a santon.  They are little figurines that are used to decorate a nativity.  We found a shepherd boy that we loved.  He didn't fit into our nativity, because our Jesus, Mary and Joseph are very big and look like giants next to him, but he looks right at home next to a house that decorates our shelf at Christmastime.

In Montenegro, I found a very beautiful and colorful Santa and he fits in perfectly with the two that I have already.  He's the Santa in the middle!

Four years ago we celebrated my mom's 94th birthday by going to Japan and brought 20 of our friends and family with us,  My friends, who live in Japan, were nice enough to arrange an overnight trip for us to the countryside where two of them live.  They rented a bus and planned a full day of activities.

The restaurant they reserved for us to have lunch in was a wonderful experience for all of us.  We had a traditional lunch served in bento boxes and sat cross legged on a tatami floor while we ate it.

On our way out of the restaurant, my daughter Lisa noticed a collection of owls sitting in trees of different sizes and they were for sale!  Me and my friend, Heidi were right behind Lisa when she saw them and we stopped to buy one along with Lisa.

I have my owls sitting on our kitchen counter.

Lisa has hers, the tallest of the three, on her fireplace mantle.

And I love the way Heidi has hers sitting on a shelf along with her other vacation memories.

My mom is Japanese and that is the reason we all wound up in Japan to celebrate her birthday.  Because we have lots of family and friends there, I have been visiting Japan regularly since my first trip when I was 12.  I have special memories of  spending the entire summer there visiting family and friends, seeing the sights and shopping!

I love shopping in Japan.  Everything is so kawaii (cute).  One thing I loved to buy was the kokeshi dolls.  My collection decorates our guest room in Florida.

My newest collection, which is not much of a collection yet, are wood signs I find in souvenir stores on our travels.  I got a couple on two separate trips we made to Gatlinburg, TN.  I have plans to have a collage of them decorating my kitchen wall one day.

Lots of times when I enter someone's house, the thing that catches my eye happens to be something they picked up on vacation somewhere.  I love the way my sister, Sandie, decorated one of kitchen walls with a small shelf that holds the cutest little houses she found in Monterosso, one of the five towns that make up Cinque Terre in Italy.  The map of the area that she put above it works so nice 

together.

I also like the way Sandie used the photos she took, while on her family vacations, to create two fun collages.  One wall of her living room is decorated with her pictures of Italy...

and she has her pictures of Japan on the other.

One of my favorite decorations in my home is in the laundry room.

For almost twenty years we would go camping for a week during the summer with a group of friends.  Many of our trips were planned around beach towns.  I am not sure where I got these bright, colorful fish but all the memories of those fun times come rushing back to me every time I see them.

I also enjoy the two hanging coastal decorations that we have in our screen room.  One

we got on our vacation in Mexico and the other is a souvenir from our daughter and son-in-law's beach vacation.  I liked the way our souvenir from Lisa and Pete looked hanging in the room so much that when I saw something similar in Mexico, I had to buy it.  I do have room for a couple more so I  keep a lookout for one when I am near a beach.

Sometimes the only souvenirs I come back with from a beach vacation are shells and sand.   It's amazing how many ways you could use shells and sand to decorate.  I've seen both in lamp bases and other things made out of clear glass containers.  My Aunt Joyce uses shells to decorate frames around mirrors.

I turned our free souvenirs into beautiful decorations that we enjoy every day.  We collected sand from about 10 beach vacations and I turned it into sand art  (You can find out how I did it here!) and simply put our shells in a small glass bottle.   I display them together in my bathroom.

If you are going to decorate your home anyway, why not do it with souvenirs that will remind you of the wonderful time you had on vacation!

Do you decorate your home with your vacation memories?  We would love to hear about it!

Le Merce Festival And More - Barcelona, Spain

When we were in Barcelona before our Mediterranean cruise, we were very fortunate to be there to witness a grand celebration.  Unfortunately at the time, we didn't realize what was going on.  All we could tell was that there seemed to be a lot of excitement and fun going on all around us and we didn't know exactly why.  I have since researched and found out that the Catalans were celebrating their biggest annual 4 day festival, La Merce, often called the Festival of festivals.  It has been an official city holiday since 1871 and it celebrates the feast day of Our Lady of Mercy.  It would have been wonderful for us to know all this at the time, but we at least we did take pictures and can now understand what we were part of.

On our first day in Barcelona we noticed some large puppets a few blocks ahead of us.  We raced to catch up with this unusual sight but whatever was going on was over before we could get any closer.  Luckily, the next day we stumbled upon a building filled with the "stars" of the parade of the night before, the giants.  This parade marks the start of the La Merce festival.

The building turned out to be Palau de la Virreina.  It was formally a palace that is partially open to the public for cultural events and art exhibitions.  At the exhibition we saw, along with the giants, the Beasts of Barcelona.    I am not sure if any of the beasts were in the parade because we could only see the heads of the giants over the crowd of people.  But, I've since learned that you will see these beasts at festivals and in parades.

One of the beasts we saw at this exhibition was the imaginary animal, la tarasca.  This monster has the body of a turtle and a human face.  He can suddenly spray out fire, water or candy and will stretch out his neck to bite the nearest victim!

On the other hand, the ox is calm and peaceful.  I found out by reading the plaque near the animal, that the ox made it's first appearances in 1467 and 1568.  And, like many of the other animals, has his own music and dance.

The following day we paid more attention to the billboards all over the neighborhood and finally realized that there would be festivities in the evening to enjoy.  We spent the afternoon following Rick Steves' Ramblas Ramble self-guided walking tour and decided that we would spend the evening enjoying the celebration.

We didn't know exactly where or when the festivities were taking place so we just walked around and hoped that we would be in the right place at the right time.  We started our walk at Placa de Catalunya.  When we were there earlier in the day waiting for a bus to take us to La Sagrada Familia, we saw lots of preparations being made for something that was going to happen there and also saw what looked like a list of entertainment.

We were right.  When we returned to the plaza in the evening, there were two stages set up.  We really enjoyed the traditional performances of the singers and dancers at the first stage.

The speakers at the second stage seemed to be getting the crowd riled up about something as the audience was yelling and cheering very loudly.  I know the Catalans are fighting for independence from Spain and we did see evidence of protests and such around the city.  We couldn't say for sure that anything political was happening here, but we avoided going near that stage!

We walked around the plaza to see what else was happening here and saw boards set up and markers available for people to leave their messages.  I had to add my message.  I took a marker and joined the others.  I couldn't understand very much of what was written on those boards or what kind of message we were supposed to leave, but I did see the word POWER!!    This was my message:

We had fun in the plaza but we never saw a Le Merce sign and started to think that what was happening here was a normal weekend event and not a part of the festivities so we left the plaza and headed for the Barri Gotic area.

When we got to Avinguda del Portal de l'Angel, the boulevard lined with the most expensive stores in Barcelona, we heard drums but couldn't see a thing.  We followed the crowd of people who were following the parade and finally caught up with a high energy, very intense group of drummers.  They were so much fun to watch and we followed them along with the rest of the crowd.

They brought us near the Barcelona Cathedral where we saw preparations being made for what looked like a concert of some sort.  We thought we would get back to this area to see the entertainment but we didn't.  I read, after we got back from vacation, that there was also a light show projected on the cathedral.  We missed that also.

There were kiosks in this square, in front of the cathedral, selling all sorts of things.  The cutest sight we saw all night, though, was this group of children having a ball with a gentleman making hundreds of bubbles to be popped.

Now that we know about the Le Merce festival we would love to go back one day to appreciate it.

My dream would be going to Barcelona in September, 2026 to really enjoy this festival and also to see the finished La Sagrada Familia.

This was the last evening of our stay in Barcelona and we were ready to go back to our hotel to relax on their balcony.  We were ready to have the beer and cookies that we knew were waiting for us at their buffet.  Tomorrow we would be checking out of Hotel Continental Barcelona and checking into our cabin on our cruise ship, Vision of the Seas.  

The next morning and our final day in Barcelona, we went to mass at Barcelona Cathedral and then had brunch with our son Mike and DIL Chrissy who happened to be arriving in Barcelona, after their European cruise honeymoon, the day we were leaving, !

Then we made sure that Mike and Chrissy drank from the Fountain of Canaletes that would guarantee their return to Barcelona, which was not the fountain we found the day before.  Thank goodness we found the right fountain today.

It was a little sad leaving Barcelona because we were having a great time and loved this city.  But we had an exciting Mediterranean cruise ahead of us!

Our first stop would be Nice, France!  To be continued...