Day 5: Arriving in the Côte D'Azur and a walk around Vieux Nice

Train has officially become my absolute favourite way to travel. I've been on very few trains in my life, and this was my first time on a high-speed one. The experience was wonderful; the ride was so smooth and the seats so comfortable, not to mention the wonderful view. While I was asleep for most of the ride, the glimpses I caught of the countryside were unbelievable. There were all shades of greens and gold in the fields, scattered with small villages. The sky was radiantly blue at this time and the whole country lit up. We reached the Côte d'Azur around noon and I caught my first sight of the Mediterranean Sea. It was a bright periwinkle blue; I'd never seen water that colour before and it made for a very refreshing change from Paris's chill and rain.

Around 4, we made our way out into the town and took a very long walk, starting with the most amazing view of the port.

We walked along the coast, stopping once to walk down to the seaside where we sat briefly watching the waves crash against the rocks. Then, we walked up to the castle ruins on top of a big hill, which offered a stunning view of the city.

We walked for an hour around the top of the hill, which was a public park surrounding the ruins of a cathedral built in the 11th - 12th century.

After descending from the hill, we made our way to Old Nice, and passed dozens of restaurants and cafés, one after another, and all very cute and colourful.

We picked a place right in front of the Palais de Justice to have dinner. This was when we encountered the most unpleasant experience of our trip thus far. The food was actually quite good -- my seafood pasta was very fresh and satisfying -- and we'd both almost finished when Julie froze, staring down at a decent-sized living slug wriggling in the few remaining leaves of her salad. Fairly traumatized, she refused to pay for the salad to which the astonished waiter exclaimed over and over that it was no big deal, and not the kitchen's fault. After a very emotional and frustrating ten minutes, the waiter relented and we quickly paid for the rest of the meal and left.

We sat outside the Palais de Justice for a while afterwards to recover, and watched some people play soccer in the public court. There were old men, teenage boys, young kids, and the cutest little dog playing together, and it was so nice to see that in a public place. We also noticed how few people -- certainly no kids -- were on electronics at all, which was a wonderful difference to Toronto's head down and walk fast culture.

Our walk around the winding streets of Old Nice was lovely; we had little destination in mind but did end up walking by some very nice churches, the Town Hall, and the Opera House. We ended up in the main square when the sun was just about to go down and stopped on a bench to enjoy the view in the centre of the city.

From there, we walked along the main road back towards our house, passing by the Museum of Contemporary Art and Nice's Acropolis on the way, neither of which were great architecturally. The part I enjoyed the most about that stretch were the very creative playgrounds for kids, designed in the shape of dolphins, sea turtles, whales with climbing ropes inside, or octopuses with swings from their tentacles. It took some restraint to not hop on those jungle gyms myself. By then, the sky had darkened so we headed back down the streets and retired back to our apartment by 9:20.