FR26.20 Nice

Nice, probably one of the most famous French cities and probably one of a few that come to mind when thinking about the Côte d’Azur. We usually don’t go for big cities, but this one made us curious.

We booked a campsite for 4 nights a little bit outside the city some 45 minutes from the city centre by public transport. At least that was the advertised travel time. In reality it was more like 60 minutes and plagued with delays and traffic jams. Anyway, we made it to the promenade and started to take in the city.

The beach was packed, really packed and we were surprised how many people apparently had the ability to lie comfortably on the rocks as it’s not a sandy beach. Taking a left turn we found ourselves in the old town (Vieille Ville) and started to take random turns instead of following a path.

Despite the late-ish hour and the return journey still ahead of us we decided to walk up to the top of the little hill to take in an almost 360° view of the city from the viewpoints. It was well worth putting off dinner for a little longer as the city is just stunning from above!

The day was coming to an end and we started to head back. We decided to take the train-bus option instead of the bus-bus route hoping it would be faster and less riddled with delays. Unfortunately, the French ticket machines are even worse than the German ones asking for all kinds of details including date of birth, email address, phone number and residential address! The touchscreen was from the 80s and only accepted one keystroke every 10 seconds or so and in the end we missed the train we wanted to take. Luckily another train was scheduled to depart in 15 minutes and we were certain we would be able to get two tickets out of the machine in that time. And we did, although the machine was out of paper and advised that we would receive the tickets by email.

Fine by us, except that the barriers refused to scan the QR codes of the tickets. Apparently the barriers were emitting an NFC signal as the iPhones always switched into wallet mode.

In the end we had to use the customer two-way-radio next to the barriers where a friendly Indian-sounding voice asked us to show the tickets to the little camera. Satisfied that we were not trying to scam SNCF out of millions of Euros he remote-opened the gates and we hopped on the train about 2 minutes before it departed.

The next day we decided to give the bus-tram option a go, but we were equally stuck in traffic which was the final nail in the coffin for public transport.

Our first destination was the Russian Orthodox church which was very impressive. We had both never seen one and really liked the architecture.

Afterwards we walked the streets and had fantastic coffees and croissants. We watched couples dance in public and generally just enjoyed the happy vibes of the city. Once again the beaches were packed and in some locations they had created little patches of sandy beach to play volleyball matches on.

We made plans for the evening and decided to head back to Wilma, get changed and properly throw ourselves into the nightlife of Nice. Waiting for our Uber next to Théâtre de Verdure de Nice we noticed electronic music coming from the venue. Kathrin quickly went and checked it. It turned out there was a mini electronic festival happening and the final DJ was Fritz Kalkbrenner. We decided to check it out once we had changed and returned to the city.

Arriving at Wilma we had some dinner and changed into some more nightlife-appropriate attire and called an Uber. Our driver arrived in a white Tesla, interpreted speed limits as mere suggestions and turned out to be our first DJ for the night choosing one banger song from Coldplay after the other. Within 20 minutes (yes, 20, not 60! take that public transport 🖕) we were back at the theatre.

We checked the prices and were surprised they had dropped to 20€ per person from 39€ per person on the internet. That made us very suspicious and we decided to try and take a peek through the barriers. Quickly a gap was found and we stuck our noses in to get a feeling for the vibe. To our surprise it looked like most people were not dancing and looked rather bored. In addition we noticed just how small the crowd seemed to be. Unsure how to interpret this, we decided to walk around and have a listen.

The current DJ didn’t really hit our preference for electronic music and when we returned to the entry we noticed the price had dropped again to 10€ per person. Properly confused we saw a group of young people leaving the venue and I decided to ask them about the vibe. They were visiting from the US and I hadn’t even finished my question when they replied “Don’t go in, there is no vibe, it’s a waste of money!” (Yes, we are paraphrasing as the verbatim answer wasn’t exactly PG-13 🤣) They offered their tickets to us, but at that point we no longer had any interest in the concert and decided to go for some nice cocktails instead as well as a jazz bar with live music that is highly recommended on the internet.

The cocktail bar turned out to be an absolute gem and moments before we took our seats a large group of 50+ French folks took control of the dance floor. The vibes were incredible and the drinks hit the right spot. Slightly tipsy after 3 cocktails we went to the jazz club where the music was perfect and the people were dancing.

What a great night and a great way to end our visit to Nice as well as end our first tour through Southern France.

We will be back and so should you!