One of the great aspects of a Mediterranean cruise is that you wake up every morning in a new port. There are no sea days, all of the traveling occurs in at night after the weary tourists are herded back onboard ship. A drink or two in the lounge as you watch land turn into water is a great way to relax between said herding and dining on delicious meals but before giving into the dreamless sleep of exhaustion.
If you're up earlier enough you can enjoy breakfast and coffee while watching the ship pull into port...or in the case of Nice, anchor offshore. It's really a wonderful ways to start the day.
It was our first day of the cruise so we were still bright eyed, bushy tailed and ready to take on Europe, or at least Nice.
Nice is a beautiful French coastal city with shopping, site-seeing, and a lovely open air market. To reach it from the ship required a tender and a train ride. Looking back as we made our way to the train station from the dock, we wished our ship, Vision of the Seas, the best of luck fending off the little boat armada that appeared poised for attack.
As we wandered, not aimlessly which is our usual modus operandi because our daughter had a schedule of places to see, we discovered a large city square with paving suspiciously similar to what one sees in wonderland movies.
Walking a straight line here is impossible.
The square had a rather large and intriguing statue.
Yes, he is wearing a crown of horses.
As much as I enjoy shopping, our limited time meant it was more window shopping except for when we found the outdoor market. Such a great place to buy gifts for the family...and to drool over what we couldn't bring home.
More wandering brought us to the beach as Nice is a coastal town. And it's beautiful, just a touch rocky.
While it was nice to explore Nice, Eze, a neighboring medieval town was on the list of places our daughter really wanted to see so after a couple of hours in the city off we went. One more train ride followed by a sketchy, overpacked bus ride up a narrow, twisty road and there we were!
At the very bottom of the town with only a steep climb up to the charming medieval part. But first, lunch.
With even narrower cobblestoned streets that are deceptively maze like, Eze is a delightful place to visit.
Small, unassuming shops blend beautiful into their surroundings.
Be forewarned, the inclines do not stop when you reach the town proper. It's all uphill here so resting when you find a beautiful bridge to sit under is important.
With Eze being all incline, the trip back to the ship was all decline. And quite a downhill it was. The bus dropped us off not at the train station but above the town where the Vision awaited our return. It was a long way with too many steps to want to count to reach the tenders. Winding through the hillsides and houses, even past a cemetery as the bay grew larger was a fun experience even though by this time we were wore out.
And we still had to prepare for the ship's fancy dress dinner night.
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