Good evening! Bonsoir!
Today is Saturday and we left Venice...so again it is a travel day. We got up, packed and faced the fact that we were leaving with a bit of sadness, because we could have easily enjoyed a few more days. It's a place we'd like to come back to perhaps at Christmas sometime. It's been wonderful in Venice.
After our breakfast outside on the lovely patio, we went for a short walk around the area, just to try to soak in as much as possible once more.
The water taxi picked us up st 9:30 am, just outside the hotel door (canal side)for a 30 minute ride to the airport. What an amazing way to travel! No dragging of luggage through the streets. The driver steps up, takes your luggage, helps you into the boat, and off you go. He drove us down the Grand Canal and out onto the lagoon which is at the north end of the Adriatic Sea. Who would dream you could take a boat to the airport? The weather was warm and the water calm. We travelled within wooden markers and a speed limit is enforced, because I could easily imagine tourists falling off the boat as they tried to take pictures of the Grand Canal!
We arrived at the surprisingly small Venice, Marco Polo Airport. The airport was so crowded and there seemed to be mass confusion. People were worried about missing flights and no one knew what line up they were supposed to be in. You could hear people whispering bitter, nasty comments about the Italians. We found the machine to print our boarding passes and eventually got into the right line to check our baggage in. We waited in line for what seemed like forever. We could see there was quite a hold up by a couple at one of the baggage check points. They were struggling with 2 pieces of luggage which came to a total of 55 kilograms. You are only allowed 23 kilos each, so what were they going to do with an extra 9 kilos? That's like 20 lbs of extra luggage. Their suitcases were wide open and they were shifting around large piles of clothing and whatnot from one place to another. Finally, they stuffed their carry-ons with who knows what, and finally moved on. The line moved speedily after this, and we got our baggage checked. We went through security then to Gate 9 and onto a bus to be transported out to the plane. Soon the bus was full and we were wheeled all of 40 feet to the plane. Everyone laughed. Finally, we boarded our plane (Air France) to Nice (or Nizza, if you are Italian).
We arrived at 1:00 pm in Nice, France. Air France has very nice planes, I must say. We gathered our luggage, and went to pick up our rental car and started on our way to the bed and breakfast called Mas Samarande in Vallauris (on the Cote d' Azur near Cannes). We arrived at around 4:00 pm and met our friendly, French hosts named Mireille and Pierre Diot. We had a tour of the property. I think we found paradise!
We had coffee with our hosts, and then went to our beautiful Provençal room. I was reminded how much I love this part of the world. The colors are so light, and there is such an airy feel to this home and its rooms.
Unfortunately the spell was broken, and we had to break down and go wash a pile of clothing in a teensy laundromat in nearby Golfe-Juan. This just has to happen every now and then. We sat in the dreary laundromat looking at French magazines and sharing a fresh, warm baguette purchased at the Boulangerie right across the street.
Finally, with clean clothes, we went back to our room.
We're looking forward to tomorrow, because Pierre was rubbing his hands together while telling us in a very thick, French accent,"I have lots of plans for you tomorrow!"
I think I'm going to love it here...
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