Bonjour,

We were in Nice for four days. Parts of those days were spent on trips outside of the city to other towns and locations in the area. The weather was great in Nice and it was a great place to start our trip. Nice is an old city and has a long heritage. It was a city for the Greeks, then the Romans, the French, the Italians, then the French again. Nice is really close to the Italian border and this area was part of Italy several times in its past history. Italian people have been living in Nice for centuries and still live there today. It’s a very multi-cultural city. British aristocrats began building houses there in the late 18th century, for the climate. At some time in its past, the Russians kept their naval fleet in Nice, so Russian aristocrats built houses here, both for business and the climate. Nice sits on the Mediterranean Sea and of course has a Mediterranean climate, just like our own here in California. Almost all of the plants in Nice were very familiar to us.

1. You can see an overview of Nice in the first photo. This was taken from Castle Hill, which is along the bottom of the photo. You can see Old Town between Castle Hill, the Mediterranean, and the river as it forms a triangle between those three. The river has been covered over so you can’t see it in the photo.

2. The port of Nice is on the other side of Castle Hill. This is the view of the port from Castle Hill in the second photo.

3. Right behind the old city wall and along the sea is part of old town with its old buildings, street side cafes and an open air market. Castle Hill is in the background.

4. This is the view from our hotel. You can see that they have paved over the river and installed water art, children's playgrounds, and lawn areas. The buildings on the other side are in Old Town Nice. The river still flows underneath and out to the Mediterranean.

5. Public art is a huge part of Nice and all of France. This rather interesting and extremely large piece of art was at the Modern Art Museum.

Voila,

Bill