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.

France Day 13 - more Nice

Sunday September 22

The gentleman at the reception desk pointed out churches very close on a paper map. He spoke a bit confusing because he called one Christian and the other anglican. We just set out. 

When we arrived at the one which seemed anglican it seemed it had just started. We stood for a while at the back entry but an usher insisted that we sit down. The church seemed well attended with lots of young people. The service was in French and the lady priest/pastor talked a lot. It seemed to be a special service because there was more ordination/introdutioning going on than worshipping. The hymns sang by the congregation (text for us on a very big screen) were very nice. The hymns were familiar to us and James tried his luck in French.

The choir (people with orange scarfs) came forward twice and that was very nice. 

 

After more than an hour those formal things were too much for us and we sneeked out.

We decided to walk to the Russian Orthodox Cathedral which we were told we really should see.

I had seen this street name the day before: Rue Herold

Yes, they named a street after my maiden name. 

With the map on my iphone it was no problem finding the church. And yes, it was well worth doing the walk. 

There were benches around the walls. Otherwise you stand. We remember from our visit to Russia that people come and go during worship times, different than what we know.

It was nice to see more dedicated serious people and not so many "tourists". 

Of course there was a gift shop. I did find an addition to my nativity collection.

It was such a nice day that we decided to walk around the church building because the grounds were lovely too. When we finally went towards the exit there were three tiny little birds hopping around on the ground under a bush. They didn't care that we were just standing there next to them.

It wasn't easy to take this photo because there were so many very large super expensive cars always in the way.

By now it was 1:30 pm and we decided that we needed at least something to drink. Nice is full of cafes with tables and chairs on the sidewalks ... except when you look for one. Finally we found a Boulangerie. We shared a savory sandwich and something sweet. After all the French are famous for it. 

With fresh energy we walked down again to the Promenade des Anglais. The Ironman thing was in full swing. We had fun taking the environment in, clapping and encouraging when a runner came by and watching the helpers helping people to cross the track when appropriate. 

When we had enough of that I remembered that we still needed a charging cable like we had bought in Fnac in Lyon. My iPhone map was guiding us to one here. 

But at 3 pm we noticed that our liquid intake today was not satisfactory. We were going through a street which looked pretty deserted (no tourists) and the cafe owner hardly spoke English. That was good because it made me try harder. 

Fnac only had one of those cables left. It was in a broken box but we took it. 

Check mark ✅ and this time we knew how to check ourselves out. Mission accomplished!

Apposite was another church building:

The Basilica of Notre-Dame de Nice is a Roman Catholic basilica situated on the Avenue Jean Médecin in the centre of Nice, in France. It is built in the Neo-Gothic architectural tradition. The basilica, built between 1864 and 1868, was designed by Louis Lenormand and is the largest church in Nice, but is not the cathedral of the city. Inspired by Angers Cathedral, it is built in the Gothic style.

On the way back to the hotel we passed the church we visited in the morning. We hoped  it was still open so I could take insight photos but it was closed. 

Found this tablet on the building though. 

It was lovely until the wind got too strong. But it was nice inside too. 

We were impressed with ourselves!

This day was good for us. No regrets that we skipped Monaco. The Lord was with us here.