Another decision made in the morning that we were going to catch a train in 30 minutes. Andre heads up to the train station to get tickets, Joey and I finish getting ready and hit the boulangerie for croissants and pain au chocolate for the train ride, no time to eat at home.
Our first country to visit today is Italy, the town of Ventimiglia that is just across the French border. It seemed like every second train was cancelled because of a strike today, never did figure out if it was France or Italy striking, but still trains leaving once an hour at least all morning. We all loved Ventimiglia. Not many tourists, lots of locals out and about doing their business. First stop was for some pistachio sfogliatelle that the bakery had a line up to get it in of locals so we figured it would be good, we were right. Stopped at the tourist information spot and got a map and some great directions on how to visit old town. Also got bad news from her that all trains were cancelled today and she gave us a card for a taxi. What? We were just at the train station and all looked fine. Off we go back to the train station, it still looks good, so we decide to visit the town for 2 hours. What a great 2 hours. The old town is on the very top of a hill, but very lucky for us tourist information showed us where an elevator was part way through the tunnel to old town. Loved visiting the tiny streets here that are from medieval times. The Chiesa di San Michele was open for us to visit the underground Baptistry and Crypt from around the year 1000. We saw the library which is from 1648 and one of the oldest in Italy. Cathedral Dell'Assumta was very impressive and highly decorated even though there are no pews. We climbed to the old fort, amazing that people are living basically in the walls now. Time to head back to the train, back through the market that had lots of amazing fresh fruit and vegetables, as well as an antique market today. Trains were running as expected so we are now off to Menton for the Lemon Festival.
Arrived in Menton, France (country 2 today). On arrival into France we think it was border security got on board the train asking for ID. We all thought he was asking for tickets so got those out, no he wanted passports. Andre had photocopies of our passports on him, but we were told these weren't good. But he said we were OK. Joey had no ID at all on her, Andre said that's her sister and he asked where she was from, Canadian, so we were OK, phew. Didn't think of taking passports at all with us this morning, now we need to research if we are supposed to carry them with us all the time, or if it is just because we crossed from Italy back to France. No parade for Lemon Festival in Menton today, but there are some great characters/sculptures made out of oranges and lemons representing the Olympics. This sculptures were huge, about 40 feet high, so impressive. They are all on display in one park leading to the sea from the train station. Next we walked along the Promenade de Soleil, without much sun, to find somewhere for lunch. Ended up at a little pizza shop which was very good and we were a little off the beaten track so only locals with us again. Walked back along the Promenade de Soleil towards old town, what a beautiful walk. Looking up into old town from the water really reminded us of Cinque Terre in Italy, absolutely beautiful. Time to walk up to old town, unfortunately no escalators or elevators in site so we are climbing up steps, but absolutely beautiful steps to old town. Walked around old town, including visiting a cemetery, nice views of the harbour below. Back down to the main town to catch the train as we are all getting a bit tired at this point and decide to head home.
Head home turns out to be a problem. First we have a problem with strikes today, now we have an even more serious problem, there has been a rockslide and some of the tracks have been destroyed between Menton and Nice. We are told to take the train to Monaco as there will be more options for us to get to Nice from there than there is from Menton, there is only one bus from Menton for the rest of the day as it is Saturday. So we get on the one train that is at the stop and it is supposed to go to Nice, it is leaving one hour late. The other passengers that are already on the train at this point have no idea that we are only going as far as Monaco. Announcement is made that we are terminating in Monaco and if you are going any further you need to find your own way. Off the train we go in Monaco (3rd country today) and to the bus station, a bus comes once an hour and there have to already be 2 to 3 hundred people waiting already for the one bus that will arrive in 20 minutes. We do not even want to deal with this, police told us to go towards the Casino and we could get a taxi. No taxis to be found that weren't already reserved and no one seems to want to help us. Decision made to head back towards where we walked into Monaco yesterday and try to find a taxi from there. End up walking quite a way and come out at the Aquarium, and right outside there is a taxi phone! Call the taxi and told it will be a while but one will come. Ends up taking about 45 minutes for it to show up but at this point it is about 6PM, we started out at 8AM this morning and we were done. We were told it would be around 100 Euro earlier today by another taxi driver that was already booked, so we weren't shocked with the 108 Euro final tab. We really had visions of us having to find somewhere to stay in Monaco, that would have cost us a lot more than the taxi!
Reached our biggest step count today of our vacation today 31,000 steps, 19.5 KM. Lots of ups and downs again today. Will sleep well tonight, and very happy to not be getting on any trains or busses tomorrow.
Off to Italy
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From here we walked back to the train station and no more pictures
you will remember this day for a while. It seems like there is always a strike somewhere.
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