Long overdue post

It's been a month since my last post - possibly the longest gap for years. It's been a hectic time, much of it presaged in my last post, but here's a brief synopsis of what I've been up to recently:

• Loft conversion completed. Now for the hard work of moving stuff up there this winter
• Walking weekend in the Borders completed (https://bvhill-walkers.blogspot.com/)
• Two of the last 3 events of the golf season completed - Quaich and Challenge. Just one event left for me now - this Thursday's visit to Monifeith for the Tayside Autumn outing.
• Holiday in Nice - more details below

We were flying from Edinburgh at 6:15 am on Saturday morning so this meant an overnight stay at the Holiday Inn Express. Arriving in good time for a mid-afternoon snack, we went out for an early dinner with Archie & Eileen (one of the couples we were holidaying with) in the evening at the Dakota Hotel - nice place and lovely meal.

They don't do alarm calls at the hotel - you just have to set the alarm on the TV, so I did - for 3:15 am. All good so far and we slept well and the alarm duly went off. As I slowly opened my eyes, I shot up, startled - it was 4 am! You've never seen two people move so quickly - no time for showers, breakfast, or even a cup of tea. Dash downstairs, order the shuttle bus, pay the bill and off we go. It all worked out in the end - the shuttle bus arrived quickly and bag drop and security were fairly easy, so we were in good time for our flight. In fact, we had time for a bit of breakfast.

The Easyjet flight was good and we were in the centre of Nice by mid-morning, French time. We had dumped our bags at left luggage and jumped on the tram, then down to the beach, stopping for drinks - and eventually lunch - at the Blue Beach Bar:

We took a walk round the Old Town/Flower Market and then went back to the airport to pick up our bags and grab a taxi up to our villa, stopping first of all for a supermarket dash round Intermarche.

Four couples, four bedrooms - so we drew lots and we did OK, getting the only downstairs room, which had one of the 3 showers and was close to one of only two toilets in the villa.

Sunday 29th September

Our first full day at the villa and it was a glorious one as we explored the surroundings:

We took a couple of UBERs down the hill to Cagnes-sur-mer for a nice lunch at a creperie, then took a walk along the prom before returning to the villa:

Monday 30th September

We picked up a couple of hire cars after which we headed to nearby Antibes and took a walk round this lovely old town - and a typical long, leisurely French lunch - a habit we found easy to adopt. There was a Picasso Museum there but we decided to give this a swerve and just walked through the narrow streets, past the market and down to the marina:

 

The obscenely sized yacht is apparently the property of the owner of Arsenal F.C.

Evenings were usually spent at the villa - food and wine flowing freely.

Tuesday 1st October

Our plan was to drive east, past Monaco/Monte Carlo up to the old mountain town of St Agnes - a slow, twisty drive up narrow streets. It was well worth it, however, with spectacular views down to the coast far below:

Four of us climbed up to the very top where the ruins of the old castle were - and there was a fine viewing platform there:

On the road back down, I took a shot of where the castle is located - who would build anything there?

Wednesday 2nd October

We met up with an old squash and golf pal, who now lives in France - some 5 hours' north of Nice. He recently lost his wife to cancer so I think he appreciated spending a couple of days with us. This day's long lunch was held in the courtyard of the old hilltop chateau in Cagnes-sur-mer. Once fed, we walked up through the narrow streets to the chateau itself:

Some of us entered the museum and climbed up the tower for a view:

Then it was back down to the cars - we had to move quickly as we were heading to the Renoir house and museum, which closed at 5 pm. Guess who we had to wait on?:

The car park was an amazing experience - it was all automated. You drive in, leave the car and it is then taken in a lift downstairs where all the cars are parked and is mechanically slotted in to one of the available spaces. On return, the car is picked off the shelf - a bit like the highly automated Amazon warehouses - and transported back up to the ground floor.

We made it to the Renoir OK and had 45 minutes to take in the experience:

Thursday 3rd October

The boys fancied hiring bikes and cycling along the prom - the girls were going to stay at the villa and look after our friend Bill's dog, Millie. We picked up the bikes in Cagnes-sur-mer on a 4 hour hire and headed east along the long Nice waterfront:

We stopped for a beer, then later for a spot of lunch and before we knew it, 3 hours had passed. We now only had one hour to get the bikes back which meant a non-stop ride on these metal lumps straight in to a strong headwind. We made it with less than 10 minutes to spare.

Friday 4th October

The plan today was to take a train ride across the border to Ventimiglia where there is a huge market every Friday, so we had to make an early start:

The trickiest part is getting parking tickets - the machines are set to defy all foreigners it seems - but we managed to crack it eventually and got a lucky break, having missed our scheduled departure, when an earlier train, running late, pulled in so we quickly jumped on it. We liked the 2 tier SNCF trains - especially once we were past Nice Central and all the commuters got off. The view of the coast from the top deck was great.

We walked round the market but Jo and I were the only couple who didn't buy anything. We had a nice walk, however, followed by yet another terrific - and expensive - lunch. By the time we had finished, the original plan to stop off briefly in Monte Carlo on the return journey had to be shelved and we just headed back to the villa to eat and drink our way through the remnants of the fridge and cupboards.

Saturday 5th October

An early, but fairly civilised, start meant we were back in Edinburgh by noon - despite an appalling line at bag drop in Nice. We dropped Keith and Annette off in Dalgety Bay, where they'd left their car, and then headed up the road, stopping briefly for a bite at the cafe at the Antiques Shop between Perth and Dundee.

That was the end of that holiday, but we had another social to attend on Sunday - the end of season Challenge lunch at the golf club. Now we need to properly detox before our next trip next Sunday, when we go to Marbella with Gary, Ross and Luca.

Today (Monday) I had another blood test - a 3 month follow-up to the last one when my thyroid levels were a bit out of the norm. Tomorrow, we go to the dermatology clinic at ARI for them to have a closer look at a small growth Jo has.