Nice and the Côte d'Azur

I’m going to try really hard to not make the obvious pun about Nice.

But that said, it was really, really… agreeable. I had heard it’s quite touristy but I guess it’s not prime tourist season yet. Yes, it had that vibe but it wasn’t overwhelming. And the Mediterranean is quite beautiful!

I spent my first day in Nice wandering around the old city, climbing up to this lookout, and then after lunch I went to a modern art museum. A bit of American pop art, some Christo… I must admit to not really getting much about modern art, but some of it was interesting.

The next day I caught a very, very full bus and headed to Monaco. I packed some bread and tinned tuna for lunch because man it is an expensive town. But it’s also very pretty, I guess that’s why the rich, famous and tax cheats head there. The luxury yachts in the harbour are amazing to look at; it boggles the mind how much they might cost.

It was a beautiful day when I was there and I sat on the beach for a while and decided to go in. As it turns out the Mediterranean is very, very cold at this time of year!

This is the famous Monte Carlo Casino, and some of the luxury cars parked out the front! This is James Bond’s favourite casino, and the architecture is kind of amazing. Apparently it was designed by the same guy who did the opera house in Paris. Somehow I was allowed inside with my still wet shorts and double pluggers with original dragon motif, where I managed to lose €10 on the black jack table. High roller, I know.

The next day I went to Antibes, which is halfway between Nice and Cannes with some people from the UK I met in my hostel. It is a really nice city! It has an old harbour with heaps and heaps of massive luxury yachts, way more than Nice and Monaco, but the town has a very different feel. It has a beautiful old town with a wall around it and a nice old church.

And out on the harbour wall is this kinda weird sculpture of a man made up of letters. I’m sure it’s all very deep, but it does look cool, and you can see it way off from the distance.

I decided to go back into a hostel in Nice, and give couchsurfing a rest for a while. Part of the reason why is because right now I’m WWOOFing in the Southern Alps, and living with this couple on their farm. I’ve been enjoying couchsurfing, but it’s good to have a mix and not be a guest in someone’s home sometimes.

Plus I think the sea air has finally clear up the sore throat I’ve had since Paris (touch wood)! More on WWOOFing later…

Swiss bliss

My whole philosophy for my year of travelling is to not really have a plan. That said, I hadn’t really expected to visit Switzerland at this point in my trip!

My couch surfing host in Annecy pointed out to me that I was only 50 kilometres from Geneva, so I thought I might as well visit. Geneva is a funny city. It’s much smaller than I had imagined. I can’t say I thought it was an amazing city, but I’m certainly glad I visited. It’s surrounded by the Alps, and on a clear day you can see Mont Blanc.

The weather while I was there was amazing. On my first day I explored the old town and the foreshore around Lake Geneva. There’s a huge water jet in the lake, which apparently goes 140 high. It is very, very pretty! And the old town is a nice place to sit and have a beer. Plus drinking in Switzerland is good for me – I can only afford one drink!

The next day I visited the United Nations office in Geneva. This is the second most important UN office after New York. It’s also a really interesting building – it was originally the headquarters for the League of Nations, which disbanded for, you know, failing to prevent World War II and the deaths of millions of people. I learnt about this in school, and the tour of the building is quite interesting.

Of course they still use it for a lot of meetings. This room us apparently most often used by the UN Council for Human Rights. This was a meeting on the rights of the disabled, and in fact I happened to bump into an Australian delegate in the book shop after the tour! I didn’t know she was Australian until I saw a small Indigenous flag pin on her lapel.

I was kind of fascinated with this room. It was the meeting room of the security council of the League of Nations, but nowadays is used primarily for peace negotiations. It has hosted negotiations between Iran and Iraq, and more recently the failed negotiations between the UN Security Council regarding Syria.

And this is the old League of Nations Assembly room, now used for major UN conferences and the occasional concert.

So as I mentioned, I hadn’t really planned on going to Switzerland, but then I thought he weather is beautiful, hey, why don’t I try to find somewhere to go hiking?

I headed to Lausanne, which is kind of on the other side of Lake Geneva from Geneva. I stayed one night in a guest house and one night couch surfing. It’s a beautiful town, with an amazing old Cathedral. You can climb the tower for the bargain price of four Swiss Francs. It was a bit of a hazy day but the view over Lake Geneva and the Alps is stunning.

I'd been looking at the organ before I climbed the tower, and as I was walking back down I could hear it playing. This kid was getting an organ lesson, and it was amazing to sit and watch him - both legs going flat out on the bass line, both hand on different keyboards - incredible.

At the bottom of the hill is an old little village called Ouchy, which is now a suburb of Lausanne. It’s right on the lake, and I sat here for a while and read, looking up to gawk at the view every now and then.

I couch surfed with three people sharing a house, and one guy took me to this Belgium pub with his mates. We drank all sorts of interesting beer, including vinegar beer, which I really like!

After Lausanne I headed to Gryon, which is a ski area. Alas it’s too late in the season to ski, but I had heard you can also hike a lot in the area. Unfortunately the weather turned crap as I arrived – in fact it started snowing! This is still very much a novelty for me. That afternoon I went for a walk in the snow to a neighbouring village. Vienna hot chocolatea have never been so good! This is the view from my room that I woke up to.

I was staying in the awesome little backpackers run by an English/Kiwi couple, Merlin and Gemma. There were other long-term guests, but I was their only short-term guest! They had friends visiting from the UK, so I kind of ended up hanging out with the four of them. They took me to these nice hot springs in Bex, which is the major town in the valley. It’s kind of weird to be swimming in wonderfully hot water while looking up at snowy mountains.

The next day I decided to try to go for a hike by myself, so getting some directions from Merlin I headed off to a place called Solalex. Merlin offered me snowshoes, but then thought I maybe wouldn’t need them. From this I have learnt the important lesson that if someone offers me snowshoes, to always accept! The visibility became worse and worse as I climbed higher, and the snow became deeper and deeper! In the end I didn’t make it to Solalex. I was pretty close, but there was a fork in the road and I wasn’t sure which way to go, and I really didn’t want to get lost and have to backtrack! Plus, I couldn’t really see anything and snow kept getting in the top of my boots. But still, it was kind of fun!

So after that I caught a train back to Geneva Airport and I’ve now flown to Nice. I had wanted to fly as little as possible, but it’s only a little bit more expensive than catching the train, and eight times faster!

So I’m back in France; I couldn’t really afford to stay in Switzerland for too long. Very glad I visited though, and I’m definitely keen to explore other parts of that country when I can. I've had a few days in Nice, which I'll write about later, and am about to head off for a spot of WWOOFing (Willing Worker On Organic Farms) - I'm going to herd goats in the Southern Alps!

Lyon and the Alps

I had an absolutely excellent couch surfing experience in Lyon, which changed my opinion of the city.

I stayed in with two hosts – two nights in each place. The first hosts were two very nice students, who were very busy in the daytime, but fun to hang out with and drink very, very cheap wine with in the evening.

The second hosts were a young French couple who were also great people. On my last full day in Lyon, the bloke, Ben, finished work at 1pm and offered to show me around the city. He was born there and knows it very well. I had wandered around the old part of Lyon, and thought it was pretty but nothing that special (I worry I’m already blasé about beautiful cobblestone streets!). But when Ben took me around and told me a little bit about the history of Lyon, it was fascinating! I didn’t know there are ancient tunnels built by the Romans, which run all under Lyon and used by the French Resistance during World War II! Or that cinema was invented in the city.

He also showed me a few amphitheatres which were built by the Romans. This one was built in 43 BC. That boggles my mind. And it’s open to the public, and apparently there are concerts held in it every now and then!
This is the basilique which overlooks Lyon, and the view from the top is incredible (if hard to photograph). 

When I left Lyon I stayed a night in Chambéry, which is a nice little town near the French Alps. After there I headed to Annecy. Now, this was recommended by my brother-in-law Steveo, and by my/our friend Léane the Parisian. In fact, she put me in touch with a couch surfing host she had stayed with in Annecy, Myriam.

Annecy is breathtakingly beautiful! I had some time between arriving in the town and meeting Myriam, so I wandered around. There’s a crystal clear river which runs through the town, which is obviously very old. Myriam told me this building was an old gaol.

The streets are beautiful, and lined with restaurants and cafés and ice cream shops, one of which had what I think would have to be the best ice cream I’ve ever had! The Alpine Savoy region is well known for its cheese, and they also use the fresh milk to make delicious ice cream. Amazing.

The river is fed from a stunning lake, which is surrounded by snow-capped mountains. Having grown up in Parkes and lived in northern Australia for the last three years, this is somewhat of a novelty for me! I spent a few hours lying on the grass in the sun reading, periodically looking up to marvel at the view.

The next day Myriam lent me a map and I caught a bus to the other side of the lake to a small village. It was surrounded with green fields, and of course, mountains!

She recommended a short hike to get a really good view of the lake, and I can’t say I it was a bad idea (click on the photo to see it larger)!

I think part of the reason I'm enjoying this part of France so much is because the weather has vastly improved! In Annecy it was 25 degrees, and I was able to wear shorts for the first time in a month. Shorts!!

What I didn’t realise about Annecy is it’s only 50 kilometres from Geneva. So I’m in Switzerland now! It is beautiful and very expensive! I also managed to find a car pooling website – it’s in French which is testing me – but I was able to get from Annecy to Geneva for free! Awesome!

I hadn’t really planned to come here, but the whole point of this trip is to have no plans. But where I go from here is anyone’s guess.

Paris, Dijon, Beaune and Lyon!

I think I've had a big few weeks since my last post.

Right now I'm in Lyon, but since my last blog post I spent another week in Paris. I had a friend from England, who I met in Ngukurr in the Northern Territory of all places, who came to hang out for a weekend. That was lots of fun, we went and found a few jazz bars, but I got a bit sick, because it was a cold weekend with a few late nights!

Before Louise came over, I kept on just hanging out in Paris, and really enjoyed just walking around, or sitting in a cafe having a coffee and reading.

I also went to the Palace of Versailles, which was amazing! It was the old Royal residence before the revolution. Pretty amazing buildings, and a pretty amazing line to get in!

The Palace of Versailles was also where the treaty to end World War I was signed, in fact it was in this room, the Hall of Mirrors. Weirdly, there was nothing about it mentioned in the information there (that I could read, at least). I had to Google it to double check!

Louise wanted to do a few touristy things in Paris, and as I'd already gone up the Eiffel Tower, I suggested we do it at night. The previous evening there had been a bomb scare there, and the line was quite long the night we went. We waited for maybe 20 minutes, and then everyone was evacuated! Guys with machine guns were directing us away. Pretty happy to do as I'm told in those circumstances. Still, it was nice to see the tower at night!

I'm not sure what it is about girls and the Moulin Rouge, but of course, we had to go there too. Not in of course, it costs like €200!

I also caught up a few times with a friend my sister Emma and brother-in-law Steve made when they living in France for a year, Léane. She showed me around Paris a bit, and even took me to see an English language comedian! Awesome!

So, I eventually decided it was time to leave Paris. I actually haven't done everything I wanted to, but I'm ok with that, because it gives me a reason to go back!

I was thinking about heading North - Léane has a friend who lives in Normandy who I could have stayed with, but she was renovating that week. Plus, I was really, really cold in Paris! So I decided to head south and hope that it might get warmer.

I caught a train to Dijon, after finding a cheap hotel on the internet. Unfortunately the one youth hostel was booked. The only downside was that, as it turned out, the hotel was a bloody long way from the middle of town, like way out in an industrial estate! Kind of weird, but I worked out I could catch a tram and a bus there, so it wasn't too bad.

Dijon is a really cool little city. After Paris it felt very, very quiet, but I liked that! And it is so pretty! It seems to have escaped some of the destruction that Paris has endured, and it just feels like an old little town.

This is Notre Dame de Dijon - a beautiful old church!

Apparently Bourgogne, or Burgundy as it is translated in English, was quite an important region back in aristocratic days. The Palace of the Dukes is a pretty amazing building, now an art gallery, and the view from the top of the tower is beautiful! Going up you can see part of the original town wall, built in the third century. It boggles the mind.



So I tried my hand at Couch Surfing for a night in Paris, which worked out well. For those not in the know, there's a website where you can go an ask people who have registered if you can stay with them for a night.

I did this in Dijon, and ended up staying with two medicine students, who were pretty damn cool and great cooks! They took me to a human beatbox festival on my first night staying with them. The next day we went hiking in this beautiful nature reserve out of Dijon.

After Dijon I caught a short train to Beaune - which advertises itself at the wine capital of Bourgogne! I reckon sometimes things just come together and you have a meal you'll always remember. The lunch I had there was one of those. I ordered the Bourgogne menu - six escargot, beef bourgogne, a plate of three local cheeses, and an ice cream with this traditional black current liqueur poured over it. All washed down of course with a local red. In short, amazing.

Apparently most of the town of Beaune has wine cellars under it. I went to the largest cellar in Bourgogne, which boasts over 3 million bottles of wine and five kilometres of tunnels! For a small fee you can taste 15 of their wines. I remember the first few were pretty good...

I also stayed with a Couch Surfing host in Beaune, which was great. We stayed up playing guitar and drinking wine - lots of fun!

Today I went to the Hotel Dieu - an historic hotel in Beaune which was built in the 15th century. It is a beautiful old building, and was used as a hospital up until the 70s.

So, this afternoon I caught a train to Lyon, and am right now in another Couch Surfing house! I have a French host, who has an American housemate, who has an American friend visiting! We are sitting around playing on our matching MacBook Pros, drinking cheap red wine. In short, life is good.

So I'm not sure what I'll do in Lyon for a few days, or what my plans are from here. But apparently Lyon is the gastronomic capital of France, so I'm sure I can't go too wrong!

Plus, it is getting warmer! It was 15 degrees today in Lyon - balmy! The Couch Surfing has been great so far. It's cheap, but it's also a bit more fun than staying in hostels. I was a bit disappointed that people weren't that friendly when I stayed in the hostel in Paris. And staying in a hotel in Dijon was nice, but not the best for socialising.

So I have four days here, then I guess it will be time to look at a map and decide where to go next.