April 12 - Provence Countryside

Lots of excitement this morning.  Our driver was early but since we were down early it was no big deal.  However, after driving few blocks the driver mentioned that we would be stopping in Monaco to pick up the last of the guests before heading down to Italy for our tour.  Since we had done that the day before it was determined that there was a mix-up on their tour manifest.  She got us back to the hotel about 5 minutes before the correct tour guide showed up.

So we were off again, this time with a first stop in Cannes.  We had been to Cannes a couple of days prior but most of today’s tour was a bit different.  Drove through a very expensive area, called the California  Pezou neighborhood, with some pretty opulent hotels and apartment buildings.

We had a bit more time on the Croisette Boulevard, with all the expensive hotels and shops...

before ending up in front of the actual film festival venue.

The area had an art piece of an old movie camera, with lots of film draped around it.

Plus there were a lot of hand prints of movie stars.

Pink Panther

Julie Andrews

Vanessa Redgrave

Michael Douglas

Then we drove up to a castle on a hill...

with great views of the city.

During the drive through the city we saw interesting murals painted on walls.  One had many iconic figures from the movies...

and the other was of an arched entrance into a courtyard.

Next stop was the town of Grasse, Perfume Capital of the World.  The tour stopped at the Flagonard perfume factory.  However, since we had been to the one in èze a week ago we opted to do a bit of sightseeing in the town itself. 

More small windy streets,

a pretty church

with its lovely interior,

a World War I memorial (we've seen a lot of them in this area of Europe)

and great views.

We had to go back to the perfume factory to catch the tour bus so stopped at the perfume museum where we saw a still...

 and a display of  labels.

On the way out of town we saw a statue of perfume vendor (from the Middle Ages),

We then drove into the countryside through the Gorges du Loup with 700 meter high cliffs...

to the tiny town of Gourdon, “Balcony of the French Riviera”.  The town is perched on top of a pretty incredible rocky cliff with great views. 

The town is pretty small, about 60 permanent residents and it takes only about 2 minutes to walk from one side of the town to the other if you don’t stop to window shop.  Tourism is the major business here with the main businesses being perfumes and soaps, crystal (one shop had a beautiful Cinderella’s Coach in crystal), nougats and other tourist items.

We had lunch at a charming café.  Unfortunately there wasn’t time to visit the castle.

The drive down the gorge included a stop (rolling stop) at a very nice waterfall, the Cascade de Courmes.

Final stop was the town of Saint Paul de Vence, the “Jewel of our Beloved Provence”.  It is one of the most visited villages in France.  It is very pretty but the fact that it is so close to Nice and Cannes probably helps with the tourist numbers.

It had the usual narrow windy streets...,

 full of tourists

and lots of art and souvenir shops.

There were interesting old buildings...

and of course the usually old church.

At the end of one of the streets was an overlook that looked out over the valley beyond...

and the cemetery.

On our way back to Nice we drove by this very interesting building.

We also got a good shot of the Regina Hotel from a distance.

on our way back to Nice.  We wandered down to the old city for dinner and were back in the hotel pretty early.  

Packing tonight as we fly to Ireland tomorrow.…we probably both miss the voyage where we didn’t have to continually repack.