Bookmarking the Riviera

I took this photo in France, uploaded it in Italy, and am finally putting fingertips to keyboard in Germany.

This is nuts.  And I have only myself to blame.  I planned this part of the trip.

On travel forums, there's always some tiresome person exhorting an excited tourist to "go slow" and "visit fewer places."  These people drive me nuts.  It's like sitting someone down in front of a feast of every imaginable delicacy and advising them to eat a small, balanced meal of mostly fruits and vegetables.  Meanwhile, you're eyeing the chorizo and roquefort and tortelloni and dunkelweiss.

The annoying thing is...these people are right.

We are finding that, the longer we travel, the slower we need to go.  These days, we agree that two weeks is the bare minimum we can tolerate touching down in a new place.

Our one week in Cannes was the briefest skim across the surface of a region -- the Riviera -- we both would really like to visit again.

It went a little something like this...

Upper deck TGV high speed train from Paris to Cannes (French trains are good!).  Five hours to relax, have lunch and coffee, read the Kindle ;-)

Tumble off the train with the other beachy travelers and their kids, hoof five heavy suitcases down one set of stairs and up another, elbow our way to the front of the taxi line and..."impossible."  Of course, no taxi driver will have us and all our bags.  Eventually we strongarm some guy into taking us, and we get the scenic route to our sweet little flat...where a very organized British expat actually helps us carry a suitcase.

He shows us the view out the back window, "That's La Californie, where all of the rich people live."

What a funny thought.  Every day I'm aware of how fortunate I am to be taking this trip.  More than a lifetime of travel, all in a single year.

Where we've touched down in Cannes is decidedly middle class.  And we both like it, a lot.  First off, we like our comfortable little flat.  It's sunny with stone floors and a well-equipped kitchen (and a nice collection of English-language mystery novels).

Down the street is a megaplex grocery store, as well as an excellent halal butcher and small North African grocery.  The woman who helped me at the grocery was awesome.  She tempted me with an entire deli case of pastries and explained that the thin raw pancakes they sold were for filling with seasoned meat and deep frying.  I think it's called brick or brik, and you might have tried it in the form of "Moroccan cigars." 

On the same street there was a couscous restaurant called Le Maghreb that was always packed.

Perhaps you, like I, have heard the word "Maghreb" before but don't know what it means.  I think it's worth quoting the whole first paragraph of the Wikipedia entry:

The Maghreb (Arabic: المغرب, Berber: Tamazɣa) is usually defined as much or most of the region of Northwest Africa, west of Egypt. The traditional definition as being the region including the Atlas Mountains and the coastal plains of Morocco, Algeria, Tunisia, and (usually) Libya, was later superseded, especially since the 1989 formation of the Arab Maghreb Union, by the inclusion of a fifth nation, Mauritania, and of the disputed territory of Western Sahara (mostly controlled by Morocco). During the Al-Andalus era in Spain, the Maghreb's inhabitants, Maghrebis, were known as "Moors";[1] the Muslim areas of Spain in those times were usually included in contemporary definitions of the Maghreb---hence the use of 'Moor' or 'Moors' to describe the Muslim inhabitants of Spain by Christian and other Western sources.

Interestingly, there's a thinktank in DC devoted to educating the US about this region.  It's called The Maghreb Center, started in 2006.

So it turns out, our little neighborhood was a microcosm of that culture.  Or that's what the guy at the couscous restaurant told me.  You see, we had time to chat.  I had rushed in, mistakenly thinking that the plats à emporter sign outside meant I could bop in and quickly get some couscous and lamb skewers for dinner.  

Ha ha ha. What ensued was a comedy of cross-cultural nuttiness:

• I walk in at 6:45 and am told to come back at 7.
• I come back at 7 and the guy asks me for my plates.  ?  It turns out, in France, or perhaps just at this restaurant, the customer, not the restaurant, provides the vessels.
• At 7:15 I return with plates and Tupperware.  The men behind the counter look at me quizzically.  "Are these your plates?"  Yes.  Turns out I was supposed to bring two metal pots, one with a steamer bottom. They say they will loan me some dishes.  It then becomes apparent that the order which I gave 20 minutes ago never reached the kitchen.
• 7:20.  Several other people have come in with metal pots (or couscousiers).  Some are sitting outside waiting.  Very little food has left the kitchen.
• 7:30.  I start receiving text messages from E ("Everything OK?").
• 7:40.  I have been offered drinks and chatted with the counter guy about plans to visit the US.  Still no food.
• 7:45.  More inbound text messages.  One of my Tupperware containers emerges.
• 8pm.  Finally I arrive at home with our "takeout." 

And after all that, I'd love to tell you the food was fantastic.  But it was just ok.

We had better couscous at the more touristy Le Riad.  Better, not fantastic.  That said, I love the combination of buttery-scented steamed couscous, stewed carrots, turnips, and chickpeas, and -- hooray -- harissa, dried spices (cumin and coriander?  thyme?), and pickled veggies.  Whoops, and meat.

Yum.  Harissa, which I'm going to try making soon, typically contains a couple kinds of dried peppers, caraway, coriander, cumin, dried mint, lemon and garlic.  Here's an NPR story all about it.

It would be very hard to live in a culture without hot food.  My favorite cuisines these days are Sichuan and Mexican.  North African could join the pack if we could find some better restaurants...

Still, we preferred French baguettes to Tunisian baked bread.  And since this was our last week in France, we ate it every chance we could get.  (As opposed to when we were in Paris.)  Happily, we were three blocks from L'Epi d'Or, which had lines out the door before breakfast, lunch, and dinner. 

Here I am on the French Riviera, trying to educate myself about couscous ;-) I don't think that's why most people come to Cannes.  They come for the sun!  In Ferraris, on cruise ships, on the packed local train.  It's not just a ritzy place.  Everyone comes here. Cannes is a year-round conference destination, so there's a full-time population and a range of accommodations, 30-Euro-beaches and free beaches, palm trees and pine trees...

During our stay, there was an electronic music festival, an antique fair, and a fireworks contest.  I've never seen fireworks like that.  It started out with spy movie music, moved on to opera, and had understated moments like the sound of waves with little blue explosions lighting up the horizon...

I myself did not lie on the beach.  It was too d*** hot!  I hopped on the train and went exploring.  The trains in France are so awesome!  You can go so many places and it's so easy.

You can go to places like...

Hong Kong?

I called E.  "You're not going to believe this..."

Instead of escalators, they have elevators.  But otherwise, it's extremely expensive, densely packed housing in a tiny space...with great views.

E came back with me the next day and we plonked ourselves down with homemade sandwiches in front of the Nouveau Musée National de Monaco.  Nice white umbrellas, million-dollar view, nobody bugged us.  Pretty good!

That's just one kind of millionaires' scene on the Riviera.  There's something slightly tacky about Monaco.  Not so, Antibes.  Antibes rocks that kind of low-key cool affected by people who have long since tired of glitz.  You pull up your yacht in front of the 16th century Fort Carré, step out in your Saint James stripes, and restock the boat from the fancy food shops in town.

Ooh la la, people have been doing this for years...

Antibes just looks cool.  I had to have my picture taken there too.  One reason is Spanish artist Jaume Plensa's white steel sculpture called Nomade, standing all by itself on the ramparts of Port Vauban (the largest Marina in Europe).  Who should I find marveling and chat-chat-chatting all around the sculpture?  A big Italian family.

Italians know a thing or two about looking good, I'd say.  And actually, this was the second time recently that Italians have insisted on taking a photo for me when I was trying to snap my own picture.

Check this out, first photo I'm the photographer (not very flattering, is it?)

Next photo, Italian photographer.  Much better, eh?  But we'll get to Italians next post.

My last stop on the Riviera was Nice.  After a long walk through a not-so-attractive city, I winced upon reaching the water.  This would have made a fantastic running route, instead of weaving through Cannes' crowded walkway.

And jeez, look at that water!

All that open room to run (and bike) and that beautiful water...perfect place for a triathlon.  They did an Ironman in Nice in June.  If I were an ironperson, like my friend HM, I'd be all over this one.

Poof.  One week gone.  I didn't go to the Chapel du Rosaire (Matisse Chapel) or the Matisse Museum or the Picasso Museum or the Maeght Foundation or the Fragonard Perfume Museum...

That's what they don't tell you about traveling too fast.

Your little nerve endings can't handle it.  I practically blew a gasket in Paris and now all of this amazing stuff.  I can't absorb it.  Sometimes I take a picture and hope when I'm not so overwhelmed I can take in the rest of it in...  Meanwhile I'm struggling to do basic arithmetic I'm so overwhelmed.

And who's to blame for this exquisite torture of an unending banquet of new and amazing experiences?  Me!  I planned it.

So what's next?  Lake-friggin'-Como.  Stendhal Syndrome here I come!