May 19: Not Attending the Film Festival
It was clear that our arrival in Nice coincided with the Cannes Film Festival (which ran from May 16 through May 27), based on the amount of traffic on and off the train as we passed through Cannes, which is about 25km from Nice. Similarly, a lot of tourists had taken the opportunity to stay in and visit Nice as well. It seemed funny that we were using such a beautiful tourist destination as a one-day train break, but we made the best of it.
After setting up our next night train, Julia and I decided to take a break from the usual European fare and had Chinese takeaway for lunch. I enjoyed a Coke and some mediocre Lo Mein, but it didn’t bother me a bit.
The beaches of Nice were fantastic; it’s obvious why people come here. While it’s a bit overcrowded for my tastes, I welcomed the beach’s clear water and perfectly blue sky. We also got our first glimpse of nude sunbathers, though there seemed to be little correlation between beauty and nudity.
Julia and I split up for the better part of the afternoon. I stopped by the hostel to clean up, then headed into town to check out the shops. I spent a good bit of time in the Virgin Megastore, which I discovered holds a very diverse array of products, as if it is meant to replace a whole host of smaller stores. In addition to the expected CDs, DVDs and games, they carried electronics, books, painting and art supplies, office supplies, and greeting cards. It’s like Borders, Office Depot, and Sam Flax combined. We met back up in the shopping district, and dinner at La Lorraine was excellent.
We grabbed our bags and headed to the station to catch our night train. This time we could only book a normal 6-seater compartment rather than a couchette, so sleep was sporadic. There were many more stops along the train’s route with passengers entering and leaving our compartment, so at times we were able to lay across our respective seats to sleep, and at other times we had to sit upright. As if that didn’t make it hard enough to sleep, we were awakened numerous times to have our tickets checked. (On our earlier French train from Paris to Narbonne, our tickets were checked before boarding so that it was unnecessary to wake us.)
View the Nice Photo Set