Day 36 – Friday 13th April 2018
At last the rain has stopped! Ventured out to get some beer in. In the afternoon we hopped on Zippy and went on the coast road around the Cap d’Antibes to Juan-Les-Pins. We stopped at a beach along the way and walked on the coastal path to Cap Gros.
Antibes from the Cap
Great, I love a dangerous coastal path! Pity there is no squall today
View from Cap Gros
The Cap d’Antibes is mega posh, there are some fantastic looking houses but some of them have razor wire on top of their walls and railings, not the greatest look
Mega posh places on the drive into Juan-Les-Pins too but the town itself was a bit of a disappointment, they have a couple of fantastic beaches but it was a bit too touristy for me. God knows what it is like in August.
£100 for a pair of shorts!
Juan-Les-Pins – apparently where My Lovely from the Peter Sarstedt song goes to on her summer vacation
Most of the beach bar owners in Juan-Les-Pins were busy cleaning up after the rain and storms of the last few days. Just near our campsite there was a mini tornado on the 12th and it blew over and wrecked the pay booth at the local petrol station. No wonder they closed the coast road that day.
Day 37 – Saturday 14th April 2018
Wonderful not to wake up to grey skies. Into Antibes on Zippy for a wonder around town before a raft race in the harbour.
€10 for 10 tomatoes – another French Riviera bargain
There were a couple of antique/junk markets on today.
Who buys this rubbish
The raft race was a rather drunken affair – most of the crews were British.
After lunch we happened upon the Musee Picasso. I’m not a great one for modern art museums as they tend to be full of crap but I thought this one might be okay as Picasso was supposed to be quite good.
What a cheek, there were hardly any Picassos in there.
One of about four Picassos
There were some really crap other artists on display.
Hans Hartung – This was clearly done with a household paint roller. I could have easily knocked this off in half an hour…
Pierrette Bloch – I think if you’d have handed this in as part of your GCSE Art course work you’d have got a U.
€6 thrown away!
Late in the afternoon I took Zippy to Nice to see what the route was like, Julie is not a fan of fast duel carriageways. Not too bad a ride, we’ll be going there again on Monday or Tuesday.
Day 38 – Sunday 15th April 2018
A quiet relaxing day. Julie did the laundry and I washed the van, noticed the passenger side wing mirror is loose and coming off. Two of the four self tappers have sheered. Piss-poor design if you ask me.
Italian roads!
I’ll have to get this sorted. If it falls off it could do some major damage.
Mr Bigglesworth is back! This time his owner let him out and he quickly went exploring the site. Can’t imagine what Cfor thinks of him.
Mr Bigglesworth
About 5 minutes after Mr Bigglesworth passed through our pitch the Daily Mail reader next door went and told his owner that his dog needed to be kept on a lead! Cue an angry exchange. Why can’t they just shoo the cat away if they don’t want it on their pitch?
In the afternoon we had drinks with a couple of our neighbours. The Brits who own plots here tend to start drinking at about 4pm. How do they do that day after day I do not know. Mind you I did see a Swiss bloke pouring a glass of something fizzy at about 10:30 this morning.
Day 39 – Monday 16th April 2018
A baking hot day. After watching Mr Bigglesworth yesterday Cfor decided it was time to leave Nelly and to explore the campsite. Julie had kittens when he went in a friend’s motorhome and after a couple of hours of freedom Cfor was confined to quarters.
Wild Boy!
Later we fired up Zippy and set off for Villefranche-sur-Mer. Julie became ill while we were driving through Nice so we pulled over and Julie was ill at the base of a palm tree. I thought it was diplomatic not to take a photo, I guess that’s another one crossed off Julie’s bucket list. We had a sit down for a few minutes then wandered the streets for a while before popping back on Zippy and motoring on to Villefranche.
Villefranche is a lovely little town; it has an old port and harbour full of under used penis extensions and a good stretch of seafront with a couple of little beaches. I bet it’s rammed in summer.
Villefranche
On the way back we hit the Nice rush hour which was pretty ridiculous. Bumper to bumper traffic going nowhere fast with scooters weaving in and out and all over the place; they really do have supreme confidence that they won’t get crushed between a cement-mixer and an on coming bus. Judging by the number of cars here with bangs and scrapes on them I’m not too sure their confidence is well placed.
a VOR at the Hippodrome de la Côte d’Azur
Day 40 – Tuesday 17th April 2018
Not a cloud in the sky when we eventually got up; does 9am on a Monday count as a lie in?
It was baking hot but the clouds soon appeared when I took my tee shirt off to work on me tan. I have to say though I’ve lost a few pounds since I retired.
In the afternoon we went to Biot on Zippy, lovely little hilltop town.
Day 41 – Wednesday 18th April 2018
Scorcheo today, had to turn the aircon in the afternoon.
Apparently we went to the wrong Picasso museum the other day; the Norwegian lady across the way says we should have gone to the Picasso museum at Vallauris. Who knew there were two Picasso Museums! Apparently the ceramics in this one are fantastic! So in the afternoon I took Zippy to check out the road to Vallauris to see if it was one that wouldn’t scare Julie too much. Came back on the coast road, lovely drive.
In the afternoon decided something had to be done about the wing mirror. After much pissing about, why does no one in the French auto industry speak two words of English, I found a body shop who will have a go at it tomorrow.
Day 42 – Thursday 19th April 2018
Up with the lark bright and early to be first at the body shop. Only took Maurice and his mate half an hour to pop rivet on the base of the wing mirror back on to Nelly, a snip at €30.
Back at the campsite we let the rush hour traffic die down then hit the road for Vallauris and our second Picasso museum of the week.
L’homme au mouton
When we arrived in Vallauris we decided to have a potter around before going in the Musee National Picasso.
It’s not the world’s prettiest town but we did stumble on a Picasso by the market.
When we went to the Museum the lady behind the counter explained the Ceramics museum was closed for repairs but we could go into the Musee National Picasso at a reduced price of €3 each. Bargain.
What a rip off! The Musee National Picasso is actually a small 12th century chapel where Picasso had his 70th birthday party and where he offered, probably while he was drunk, to decorate it with one of his paintings called War & Peace.
A dove
Another dove
It wouldn’t be a proper Picasso without wonky tits would it
I thought we’d be at the National Picasso Musee for a few hours but after 10 minutes we were done. Another €6 thrown away!
Where Picasso lived in Vallauris from 1947 until he popped his clogs in 1973
We decided to go on to Cannes. Cannes is a very beautiful and a very smart town. Very upmarket; a step up even from Nice…
The Carlton
… and I was looking forward to walking along the world famous Croisette. Trouble was Red Bull Air Racing was in town and had closed off most of the Croisette in preparation for this weekend’s air race.
Red Bull – Twats
Body scanners, a sign of the times in France. They had tons of security staff in place and sniffer dog teams too.
So we wandered around looking at the posh shops
I wouldn’t dream of wearing anything else
and made out way to the old town
The old town
to eat our lunch
I put my slice of pizza down for a few seconds and he appeared
Cannes from the old town
Cannes has something for everyone…
… they even cater for Special Needs people
Drove home along the coast road, fabulous views on a fabulous day. We’ll be back in Cannes in June when we meet up with some friends.