Plantation Bay Resort & Spa
(Part 2 of 2: Nice)
MANILA, Philippines- There are several things to do in Nice, and I did them. (Well, not all of them.)
Why It’s Called Salade Niçoise. But first, a little history. (Very little.) Nice was founded by Greeks, who called it Nikaia, meaning Victory. Shortly after, the Greeks lost Nikaia to the Romans. A few centuries later Rome collapsed (decline and fall, etc.), leaving Nice orphaned. (It was really not well-named.) In the middle ages, Nice became part of the Kingdom of Savoy, which was sort of Italian. To this day, most Niçois (nis-WA, people of Nice) look more Italian than French. In 1861, Savoy bargained away Nice to the French, who promptly allowed it to be discovered by the British aristocracy, who then started going there every summer for the sun, there being none back home. (This is why the avenue fronting the sea is called Promenade des Anglais though as I discovered there is nothing of interest there except the casino.) Somewhere along the way, someone invented salade niçoise (suh-LAD nis-WAZ), which is lettuce with tuna, potato, onions, and olives. (The result is greater than the sum of its parts; a good salade niçoise is a thing of beauty.)
One thing to do in Nice is leave it. As more or less the epicenter of the Cote d’Azur, Nice is spitting distance from many seaside villages, as well as the country of Monaco. You can go to most of these places by train or by car.
Billionaire’s Regret. And I did. Some of them are just pretty faces. Villefranche, for example, is a quiet little village where one of the villas was bought by a Russian plutocrat for half a billion (that’s a B) euros, then when the Russian bubble burst, tried to get his deposit back. This was the most exciting thing that had ever happened in Villefranche since Caesar conquered Gaul.
Eze (EZ) is a village carved into a mountaintop. If ever a place deserved to be described as “quaint” or “picturesque,” it is Eze. (See picture.) I didn’t get to spend much time there but if you are in the vicinity you should probably try to stop for lunch at least.
Easy to Please. Then there’s Monaco, which is sort of compulsory if you’re in the Cote d’Azur. There’s always something going on there, to entertain the tax exiles from all over Europe who have made it their home. As luck would have it, there was an antique car contest or Concours d’Elegance as motoring enthusiasts call it. It probably wasn’t much of an auto show but as I had never seen one before, I guess it was okay. I saw a Bugatti. The ticket-vendor was cute.
Monaco’s terrain is spectacularly useless, which is probably why neither the Italians nor the French tried too hard to annex it since it was founded around 1300 AD. Composed of one steep hillside, the country (all two square miles of it) looks strikingly like Hong Kong, and thanks to gambling is much richer, so the principal modes of transportation are Ferraris and Bentleys, and a system of public elevators and underground tunnels.
The other thing I did in Monaco was climb the hillside to see the royal palace, which is not bad, though, as I am fond of saying, if you’ve seen one European palace, you’ve seen them all. I was surprised that there was no special museum for 1950s film star Grace Kelly, whose marriage to Prince Rainier in 1956 not only re-glamorized Monaco internationally but also brought in a dowry of $2 million (a substantial amount then) from the Kelly family. If you have never seen Grace Kelly on film, look for Mogambo or To Catch a Thief to appreciate her rare combination of “serene” and “hot.”
No Guts, No Paparazzo. The palace is an open-air, steep climb from the harbor. At the plaza in front of the palace gates, people mill around at noon to see the changing of the guard. Not interested in the changing of the guard, I was looking the other direction across the road when a black Lexus quietly crawled by behind the crowd, and by gosh! There was Prince Albert himself! I was about to take a picture but a policeman with an Armalite looked in my direction and I decided not to make any sudden moves.
To go back to Nice, if you do ever go there, you should by all means use it as a base to explore the rest of the Cote d’Azur, but there is much to Nice itself, too. The center of town is the Place Massena, which is a spectacular Italianate plaza of major dimensions. (See picture, though it doesn’t begin to convey the scale of the plaza.) Apparently it used to be pretty ugly but recently got totally rebuilt and expanded and now looks glorious, a huge open space surrounded by palace-like structures, and in purely visual terms it is more impressive than, say, Rome’s St. Peter’s Square or Berlin’s Brandenburg Gate, though historically nothing ever happened in it. The plaza is like an open-air amusement center, with break-dancers, piano players, street artists, and other entertainers.
Ticket Dispensers for Mensa Members. Off the Place Massena is Avenue Jean Medecin, where the city’s only tramline runs. The tram is an excellent way to get around for one euro a ride, though the ticket-vending machines need a high IQ to figure out (hint from your humble servant, a member of Mensa: those gadgets that you think are touch screens, aren’t). If you plan to arrive by train, consider staying at a hotel that is close to the tramline. From the train station, it is a short walk to the tram stop and you could be at your hotel in a few minutes, instead of waiting in a long taxicab line and then sitting in traffic.
Unlike the shops in Cannes, where you have to save up for a year to buy a T-shirt, the stores on Jean Medecin are actually useful to the average person, like FNAC (France’s Best Buy), Monoprix (department store), and others.
No Respect for Garibaldi the Italian. Another good area is rue Massena. (This Massena guy was popular, lots of stuff are named after him. He was one of Napoleon’s top generals, and came from Nice, I guess. The other well-known person who came from Nice was Garibaldi, who eventually unified Italy. But as we recall, Nice is part of France now, so Garibaldi gets no respect here.) Rue Massena is a pedestrian zone lined with souvenir shops, cafés, and restaurants. The only problem with rue Massena is that all the people there are tourists like you; it lowers the tone of the place.
Finally, there is the Old Town of Nice, where the buildings look a thousand years old, and the streets are mostly narrow alleys. I found this the most entertaining part of the city. It had a dark, distinctly underworld vibration, and real-life people, some of whom I imagined to be gangsters or white slavers, gathering on street corners to smoke and discuss serious and secret subjects.
Fearless Restaurant Recommendation. And now, a Major Tourist Tip. From me, to you: Chez Freddy, on the Cours Saleya, in the Old Town. This Cours is a very long open area (i.e., a court, but really long) with an unbroken string of bars and restaurants, plus the Flower Market. Freddy’s is somewhere in the middle.
I had always thought that the best paella in the world was the one made by my mother and elder sister. But sorry Mom, sorry Ate. Freddy’s shellfish paella was sublime, and the serving was gigantic, good for a party of two (this however reminded me that I was a party of one, which was saddening until I got halfway and realized I wanted the other half). Impressed, I came back another night and ordered the bouillabaisse, which was also gigantic, and also sublime, exactly what I always thought bouillabaisse should taste like (unlike the bouillabaisse in Marseille, where it tastes like – well, I’ll shut up now because there are enough death threats outstanding against me).
Though service tended to be slow, Chez Freddy renewed my faith in French cooking. After all the disappointments I had had this trip with my old standby (steak and fries), it was warming to discover that there are still some French restaurateurs charging less than 100 euros a head who care about food quality. I would be happy to go back to Nice just to eat at Chez Freddy again. If you go to Nice and fail to eat at Freddy’s, I will lose all respect for you.
Not Cheap, but Go Anyway. The Cote d’Azur has been popular with rich people and ordinary tourists alike for 150 years, not to mention moviemakers. It is not a cheap place to visit, but there is special feel to it. It has a balmy Mediterranean climate, long pebbly beaches, and rich people.