Rainy Day Activities

Unfortunately for me, it's been raining steadily all day. However, gives me an excuse to duck into an internet cafe and update all of you. Tuesday I took a day trip from Nice to Antibes (between Nice & Cannes). It is a really cute little place. Lots of nice shops, restaurants, a little market, the beach, etc. The main 2 things I wanted to do there were: visit the Chateau Grimaldi, house of the Picasso museum, and then the beach. The Picasso museum was closed for renovations - surprise, surprise... this is construction season in Europe. One of the unfortunate parts of traveling off-peak. The beach was nice, but didn't spend too much time there. Antibes is a really nice place though, and I'd recommend a stop or even a stay there.

Staying in Nice for a while now and in speaking with others at the hostel, I've come to the conclusion that the city is a decent home-base to do trips all around the coast. There are trains there to almost every location you want to visit. However, I think where you stay in Nice is critical... I started to feel agitated or unsettled or something in Nice. The hostel there was decent, convenient location, etc. but the area I was staying in, as it is with most cities (a block from the train station) was a bit sketch. It's relatively safe, but tons of construction going on and lots of dodgy people. It was started to grate on me. So yesterday I ditched Nice to come to Cannes. I got a really nice and pretty inexpensive hotel in a residential neighbourhood and it's a few blocks to walk to the main area of Cannes that every tourist is interested in visiting: La Croisette, rue d'Antibes, etc. It feels good here. I wish the weather were nicer, as I had many options for today if it had been: I may have found a place to rent a road bike, and of course, there is always the beach. Maybe tomorrow the weather will be better... in the meantime I've made the best of it. Yesterday was cool and cloudy, though not raining, so I walked, and walked and walked. Checked out what I could do, checked out the velo-rentals, etc. I'm actually getting blisters from all the walking. Then today I did something in the Cannes tradition: I went to a movie! You might think (as did I when I initially thought of doing it): why would you go to a movie on vacation? But at the same time - why not? I never go to movies when I'm at home, and vacation is the time to do things you don't normally do. So, there is a place that screens films in their original language - most of them are in English. By the time I got to the theatre the next one that was playing was An Inconvenient Truth - a MUST see!!! Loved it! I got wet this morning when I went out walking again. Considered going to Vence to the Matisse museum, but when I read up on how to get there, I wasn't sure I wanted to go to the trouble.

And speaking of doing things you don't do while at home... oh my god!!! My diet has been atrocious! So while on the bike trip I ate very well - a little too well (4-course dinners... yikes!). Now, I'm eating less in quantity, but a little too much on the junky side. My main disorder here is an addiction to Nutella. Ok, yeah, I know we can get this stuff at home, but it's not a part of our culture, so doesn't come to mind. At home I'm a peanut butter addict. I also know Nutella contains milk, and it's not overly healthy. At least with peanut butter you are getting better nutrition out of it. Anyway... they must put something in this stuff. I'm so serious! I cannot get enough of it!!! I bought a small jar of it at the grocery store and was eating it on toast (yeah, another thing I'm not supposed to eat) and crackers (better) and then just scooping it out of the jar and eating spoonfuls of it. This is a serious problem. Yesterday I think I had my zillionth Nutella crepe of the trip. Help!!!