An evening in Paris – Apr 2016

Paris – Nice – Monaco – Monte Carlo

We were planning our Eurotrip since 2013. Multiple reasons kept us from following through – wedding, other's weddings, winters, blah blah…...frankly, I thought we would never be able to find long enough vacation to go through the extravagant itinerary we had in mind. Finally, we found our tour planner. He helped shape the itinerary to fit in 10 days and still include the most important cities we wanted to cover along with some places we hadn’t thought of and which came as a pleasant surprise. After many days of research, advise from CherishTrip and advises from friends and family members, we were finally set. 

Worth it !!!

We started from Bengaluru to Paris with a stop-over at Mumbai. It is very important to mention the huge queue at the immigration counter at Mumbai international Airport. The employees at immigration desk were taking their own sweet time, making us anxious. But we somehow made it on time. I think the Jet airways crew is aware of this and they did make the flight wait for some time beyond the accepted delay. Lucky us!!!

Montmartre Square

The flight journey was long – 9 hours long. We reached Paris in the evening. It was drizzling. We started at 40 degrees and landed at 10 degrees. The streets, the buildings, the cafes are just beautiful. At every corner there is a musician with an instrument, every free wall is painted. The air in Paris also smells of art. You can spend all your time just appreciating people pursuing their dreams. 

Sacra Coeur

The Eiffel Tower, Sacra Coeur, Louvre – Mona Lisa, each of these is worth hours. You can spend an eternity in Louvre and if you have read Da-Vinci or watched “White collar” you can relate to many of the paintings. We could spot some exceptional artists making replicas of some of these famous ones in Louvre hallway. We did not have time to visit Notre Dame or Pompidou center - maybe on our next visit. Tip: People travelling to Paris, don’t worry about the travel within city - the local metro, buses are very well connected.

Nice Square

From Paris to Nice. Above is a picture of Nice square, I do not think I have words to describe the feeling when we saw the interplay of pastel colors at the various buildings there. At Nice, we were introduced to the European yogurts in breakfast and we just fell in love with the multiple fruit flavors (apricot to berries). We used to carry yogurts for the early morning train/flight trips in Europe. Here, we had lovely dinner in an open cafe with Chef suggested white wine which was delicious.

Nice View

Nice is a city on French Rivera with the most amazing pebble beach. I am a beach person; I can spend hours on the beach just listening to the waves. The clear water just adds to the perfectness of a clean beach. In the morning, there were people cleaning the beach, picking up the leftovers, an effort well appreciated. Nice had a small hill with a breath taking view of the city.

Monaco

We had a one-day tour to Monte Carlo and Monaco from Nice. Yes, we drove the Monte Carlo grand Prix race track (took 2 hours with all the sightseeing). And yes we saw the Monte Carlo Casino. On the left, is the view of Monaco from hill top.

Eze

Saint-Paul de Vence

As part of this tour we visited two French villages Eze and Saint-Paul de Vence – I think these were the highlights of our Euro trip, the narrow cobblestone streets with medieval houses.