Thursday, September 26, 2024

France Day 14 - Villa Rothchild outside Nice

Monday September 23

Sophie had kept an eye on the weatherforecast and suggested to do the visit to the Villa Rothchild in the afternoon instead of morning. She had been so right. When we woke up we could hear the rain and sometimes even thunder. Our balcony and view really looked different this morning. 

We were quite happy about it because it was the perfect excuse to be a bit lazy. 


Ha-ha, I am pretty sure we must have played cards on the 8th floor. For lunch we shared a caesar salad with crispy chicken. It was perfect for us.


At 1 pm we met Sophie and those who wanted to go. Sophie gave each a day pass for the public transportation again. First we walked to the Alsace-Lorraine Metro Station and went to the end Port Lympia. There we changed into bus 15 which took a while but the view around each corner was awesome. The whole trip takes about 50 minutes. 


After that crossing the street and walking a long driveway was all it took and we were there. 


Remember I pointed out this Villa in one of the photos from the boat ride on Saturday? This house/property is on the top of the mountain that you have a view in all directions. This is the bay you see before you enter into the giftshop where you also buy the tickets ... officially named "Villa et Jardins Ephrussi de Rothchild".



We each got an audio-guide for a self-guided tour. You went from room to room and typed in the number to get the explanation. It was very good.


We started the visit in the heart of the house, the Patio. 














We could visit the ground floor and upstairs. The following photo was taken in the spiral staircase to go down again to leave the house to visit the gardens. 


We returned the audio-guides but had a map of the 9 gardens. This is the view into the bay in which we were on Saturday's boat tour. 







Every 15 minutes there was music in this part of the gardens and the fountains started to dance to the music.









I admit that the selection of photos seem a bit random but of course I had taken many (as always) and had to choose. In the beginning I hope you saw the link I put in. That gives you a very good idea about this place. We decided that seeing this was a good choice and everything including the public transportation had been fun. If you ever are going to be in Nice, we can recommend a visit here.

We were back at about 4:30 pm as Sophie had predicted. I am not sure what we did then. There had been no more plans as a group. James and I decided to walk about a bit to see whether we could find a place to have some dinner. France too eats late, but not as late as Spain or Portugal. We found an area where all the streets are pedestrian and are full of tables and chairs. We thought it was a bit too cold for that without the sun and went into one. I had "poulp" (octopus).


Had to go up to the roof top to have another look. Just lovely.



Only one more day tomorrow. As always mixed feelings. We love to be in our place at home but traveling is another love of ours. Night, night, sweet dreams.


No comments: