Mad Marseilles and the perfurmed air of Provence

After our delicious dinner out in Juan les Pins, the following morning we're up and hit the road, intending to have a day in Marsilles on our way to Barcelona. We picked the brains of the restaurant owner the night before and she raved about Marseilles, especially the wine grown nearby and the seafood. It sounded like an intriguing mix of France and Africa.

We can't find a campground for Marseilles in our camping book and Lonely Planet doesn't recommend one either, and Ruth is no help, so we're going to have to wing it once we get there. That doesn't really work out for us though. We get close to Marseilles and exit from the motorway to find a campground on the outskirts of the city on the local roads. We see one campground but it's over 30km out from the city. Then Ruth spits us back on the motorway which ruins any chance of finding a campground. Before we know it, we're in the city streets of Marseilles not knowing where to go and what our plan is. After heated words and Ruth going on the blink for a bit we get out of Marseilles and head to Arles in Provence instead.

We find a campsite in Fontvielle, just out of Arles and pull in late afternoon. We have a late lunch and decide to flag going into Arles for a look; its late in the day and quite frankly after the drive we just had, we just want to sit and relax! Ryan settles in with a beer and a movie on the laptop while I decide to head into the village for a wander around. The village seems to be filled mostly with locals relaxing in the sun, having a quiet drink and is quiet and enchanting. There are great little shops filled with local pottery and bits and bobs, just my sort of shops. One shop has a wine cellar underneath and is selling local produce, including the renowned salt from the salt flats just out of Marseilles. I pick up some salt and then sit on a bench in the hot sunshine eating an icecream. Feeling relaxed once more, I eventually wander back to camp for our drive the next day to Barcelona.

Lifestyles of the rich and famous; the Cote de Azure

MONACO

So we arrived in the French Riviera just over a day ago where the sun was shining gloriously. We had a swim, some dinner and got drunk on the champers we bought from our first jaunt through France. Hmmm I guess that's actually a whole other story...

A WHOLE OTHER STORY

Right, so we left a soggy Levanto behind, with the sun slowly poking over the hills. The drive along the Italian coast to the French border was gorgeous, each glimpse we got of the coast below us showed us another town we could easily have stopped off in. Eventually we crossed the French border and and shortly afterwards found ourselves coasting along through the French Riviera or the Cote de A'zure. We find our campground complete with very helpful staff. After spending some time doing a small Chinese laundry load of washing and nurturing Betty for a bit (she's an old duck so she needs a little tinker every now and then) we head to the pool for a dip. Then to relax further we open some beers and have a barbie, complete with a banana split on the hot coals at the end. Bliss. We settle in for some movies on the laptop and after the beers and the last of our delicious Italian wine is gone, we decide it would be a good idea to crack open the champers we got from the Champagne region of France. Its been three months since we started our journey in France. So we sip champagne and watch Pork Pie.

The following day we sleep half the day away, sleeping off the effects of the night before. Luckily the day outside isn't up to much, being a bit drizzly. Eventually we step outside late in the afternoon and bike down to the supermarket to get some supplies for a fix of nachos for the hangovers. Ryan spills off his bike so we have to bike home carrying an injury; it's not life threatening though.

BACK TO MONACO

Right, so after arriving on the French Riviera a few days ago, we catch the train to Monaco and see the glitz and the glamour. There seems to be more plain clothes police talking not-so-secretively into their radios, than there is tourists. The streets are tidy, the parks manicured. It seems we've turned up while the Monaco Classic Week is on, so the residents are dressed up in period costume, driving classic cars and boats about. We see the casino and the port filled with its unbelievably extravagant super yachts. Then we head down into town to find the F1 track where one of us gets a little bit excited about the starting line and the ripple strips. It didn't really get me going.

We walk up to the palace and laugh at the massive crowd gathering for the changing of the guard, we've had enough of palaces and changing of guards. We take in the great views from up at the castle before heading around the point past the cathedral to the aquarium, said to be one of the best. Twenty years ago a piece of Red Sea coral reef was bought to the aquarium and has thrived so we see all sorts of amazing fish all the colours of the rainbow and coral species. We see a giant (well it seemed big!) tortoise and heaps of clown fish, including the cutest two month old baby clown fish. We see sharks and stingrays and jellyfish which are creepy little suckers.

We head back outside and down to the Monaco yacht club to mix it with the rich and famous (though didn't actually see anyone famous). Then we head off for a walk around town and around the coast a little, before calling it a day. On the way to the train station we stop by a real estate office to see how much cash one has to part with to own estate in Monaco; a six figure sum will start you off.

Back in the village near our camp we stop at the bakery and pick up some French macaroons for our desert; mmm the chocolate and raspberry flavours were delicious. The other half like the coffee flavour.

NICE IS NICE

The next morning we catch the bus along the coast to Nice and jump off when we reach the beach. We promenade for a bit, weaving our way through joggers, cyclists, roller bladers, kids on scooters and kids in strollers. We are spoilt for choice as to where to put down our towels, the beach stretches for miles, but eventually we lay down our towels and go for dip. We snooze on the beach under the warm sun. Eventually later in the afternoon we drag ourselves off the beach before heading along to the point to climb the hill and take in the town of Nice.

We stroll back along the promenade before catching the bus back to camp, not having indulged in any sightseeing for once!

JUAN LES PINS - BEACHES AND BON APPETITE

The following day we bike down the coast intending to have a poke around the village of Antibes, but before we now it we've come to the next town over again, Juan les Pins, with its old fortress on a point above the sea. We head off the coastal road onto a track that takes us into the marina which is full of yachts that would rival those moored in Monaco. We carry on and reach the down, ditch the bikes and go for a walk. It doesn't take long for us to stumble onto a gorgeous sandy beach in a small bay right outside the town walls. So we put down our towels for the day.

Later in the afternoon we bike back to camp to change out of our cosies. We bike back to Juan and find us a cosy wee restaurant for dinner. They're just opening and the chef hasn't turned up yet, so we head to the bar next door for a drink in the late evening sun. Drink drunk we head into the restaurant which is run by a Brit; we sure have struck a lot of them down here in this sunny part of the world.

We order our entrees, mains and a bottle of Provence red. Our meals are sublime and the service is great. Ryan's entree was a delicious dish of mussels done in a lot of garlic and herbs, with fresh hot bread to scoop out all the sauce, while mine is a goats cheese salad with gooey melted cheese and the tastiest vinaigrette. Our mains were monkfish on a tomato salsa with seasonal vege and a lamb kekab cooked decidedly on the rare side the way the French do. Only in France could I eat complimentary starters, an entree and main and still have room for desert, the food is quality, not quantity. For desert I have a trio of creme brulee, but one is coffee so Ryan delights in that instead. Ryan has a coffee cheesecake with a small but heavenly coffee parfait. I take one for the team and polish off the red wine as Ryan's driving tomorrow.

More than satisfied we roll out the door and wobble home on our bikes, ending our time on the Cote de A'zure.

Pizza, Pasta and Peroni's IV

THE CAPTIVATING CINQUE TERRE COASTLINE

The following morning we're on the road to Levanto on the Cinque Terre coastline, but first we're stopping in Pisa for the standard photos propping up that leaning tower they've got. We arrive on the outskirts of Pisa and find torrential rain and that traffic is back up like a long weekend in Auckland. After several misfires at getting the sat nav to get us near the damn tower and several misfires at trying to find parking, we've soon spent an hour driving around Pisa in the rain and hemmed in traffic. Eventually we stumble across some campervan parking in a supermarket parking lot.

We park, change into jeans and jackets and hurry off under our umbrellas to the tower. Luckily the rain means there's not hoards of people about so we're able to get in there, take some terrible pictures in the rain and get out again.

We carry on driving to get the hell out of Pisa and eventually the rain stops. Late in the afternoon we pull off the motorway and head down to Levanto on the coast. We find a camp and settle in before walking through the town to the information centre to suss out whether the infamous Cinque Terre coastal walk will be open tomorrow. We find out they've had some stormy weather today, so the track was shut and the ferries cancelled. We'll have to wait until tomorrow for them to assess opening it.

We bank on the track being opened and get up early and throw some daypacks together with food, camera's and lots of water. We're in luck, with all but one section open and by the time we get to that section it'll probably have opened as well. So we head off and pick up some ferry tickets to ferry down the coast and start the track from the far end, walking back towards Levanto.

The ferry ride down the coast is great, and we see all five villages that our walk is going to take us through. The villages are all a crazy, haphazard jumble of colourful buildings, four, five stories high, all crammed into little bays and on clifftops along the coast. Over centuries the land has been terraced high up the mountainsides that tumble into the sea and we can see all manner of things grown. We jump off at Riomaggoire and after a poke through the town we head off to find the start of the track. Easier said than done. You'd think given this village is at one end of the track, and can be either an end or start point, the track would be well signposted. Well you'd be wrong. After heading up some steps, more steps and along an alleyway we find ourselves back on the main street. We ask for directions and eventually find the track after a couple more false turns.

The first leg between Riomaggiore and Manarola is easy, the hardest thing is finding where the track goes in each village as a couple of signposts have been an over thought. Going through the second village we find the main street is filled not with parked cars, but parked boats! Young local kids zip down the sloping main street on scooters, yelling to make locals and visitors part to make way for them.

Between the second and third villages we find a good possie with a great view for a spot of lunch. We carry on afterwards and climb the 400 odd steps from the beach up into the village of Corniglia, the centre of the Cinque Terre coast and national park.

Between Corniglia and Vernazza we run into a kiwi couple we met down in Sorrento; they're walking the track in the opposite direction to us. We stop for another chat and run through a who's who list of people we both know in NZ. They wish us luck with the climb ahead and we carry on to Vernazza. Parched and hot we spot a wee store and line up for some gelato. Imagine our surprise when the flavours include choc chip mint and boysenberry. Yum!

From Vernazza we are ready to tackle the much talked about gut-busting last leg to Monterosso. The track climbs up away from the village and is unrelenting in climbing up, up, up. But it's a short sharp climb and soon enough the track levels out for the remainder of walk until we head down into the last village. The poor beggars going the other way have a relentless grind upwards for much of the leg before a short sharp descent. It's on the last leg that I see a girl doing the walk in a skirt, pumps and a handbag! Approaching the last village and walking amongst the vineyards growing on the terraced landscape we see workers hauling containers filled with grapes on their shoulders, grapes destined to become a delicious Cinque Terre wine.

We arrive weary in the last village and stop for a bit to watch old men playing pentanque, before catching the train back down the last bit of the coast to Levanto.

Back in town we track down a bottle of Cinque Terre wine and a couple of much needed cool drinks and then head back to camp to put up our weary feet. What a great day, what a beautiful coast.

Unfortunately the next day in Levanto is a total washout with rain, rain, rain. Even though it was meant to clear mid-afternoon, it didn't and carried on raining right through the night. With Ryan coming down with cabin fever from being cooped up inside, we ditched plans to train down the coast to La Spezia and pack-up at first light and hit the road to the South of France instead. The day is ever-so-slowly clearing as we head up away from the coast, leaving a soggy Levanto behind. Bye, bye Italy, you've been a mixed bag...