The idea that the journey is as important as the destination seems to shine through whenever I write my blogs, because our transit from city to city or country to country is always an adventure. We trained from Lyon to Nice, making friends the people on our carriage. All was well until half an hour from our destination the train broke down. We were told it would only be a fifteen minute wait. It turned out to be over 8 fifteen minute waits, over two hours until we got moving again. In that time the train, now without aircon, became a sauna. The toilets, which are really just holes leading onto the tracks started to reek because we weren't moving away from the tracks where the.. goods.. were flowing. And to add to it all, a drunk French hobo in a dashing waistcoat got on the train and started yelling at everyone in his own language. His musk was just lovely.
We cheered when the train eventually began moving, but our adventure was just beginning, because we had no accommodation booked and we arrived at 11pm. After some stumbling around with our bags we found a hostel sign. Inside was a bra-less 90 year old lady, and another older woman who seemed to somehow be her mother. We kept saying that we didn't speak French, but she wouldn't have any of it, babbling on expecting us to understand and eventually leading us down an alley to a creepy apartment building. The room was about the size of my bedroom at home and smelled like the elderly. The 5 of us crammed into 2 mini-double beds and snuggled the night away. We're no princesses, so we were happy to pay just 16 Euro for a night of accommodation (cheapest on the trip so far) despite the grossness, but the next day we checked into a nicer place at double the cost, with a lovely view of "No Taboo Sex Videos".
I know that Nice is just a name, but I always expected it to be kind of 'nice' here - really innocent and quaint - but in actual fact it is famous for its beggars and pickpockets. We even saw the waistcoated drunk from the train setting up camp in a dumpster and eating expired dairy products.
The beaches here are awesome, but we're not quite used to rocks instead of sand. I don't understand how you're supposed to walk to the water without enduring a lot of pain but no pain no gain I say!
A major highlight of Nice was our trip to Monaco, tax haven of the richest and swankiest Europeans around. You can taste the snootiness in the air as you peruse the gigantic yachts and ridiculously expensive European sports cars. The famous Monte Carlo is as impressive as we had imagined, expect our tickets only allowed access to the small public area - the private gaming rooms where all the high stakes James Bond stuff goes down are off limits. We found it strange that our passports were checked upon entry, and after inquiring we found out that residents of Monaco cannot enter. And why? Because they want Monaco to maintain it's high GDP per capita, and so don't want citizens losing money. At least they're honest about it. Surprisingly we nearly all won money, Arryn betting all his winnings on one hand and doubling up, walking out with 300 Euro profit. I was fairly content with my 2 Euro win, and rewarded myself with the most expensive and classy gin and tonic I've ever had, at 15 Euro.
We also took a day trip to Cannes which I feel deserves a mention, although there isn't much to be said of it. It was a pretty beach. People were rich. Pretty standard southern France stuff really. I am now sitting on a train to Marseille, where we have no booked accommodation and am once again pondering the truism that the journey is more important than the destination. The train was supposed to leave an hour ago. Oh, we're being ushered from the train. Platform A you say? Okay... Oh wow. No seats. We're now sitting in the baggage area. Apparently this train goes to Toulouse. We're not gonna achieve much in our half a day in Marseille anyway..
Alright. Off to Toulouse. This is backpacking.