We went to Nice for the first day of Carnival, Menton for the Citrus festival and Monaco, because it’s a whole other country! (Monaco is quite small)
We started out in Monte Carlo, Monaco. Walnut and I walked around town up to the Prince’s Palace to see the changing of the guard. It also happens to be a great viewpoint over Monaco.
view from the hotel in Monaco 
building new land on the coast 
changing of the guard 
view from Prince’s Palace 
Jardins de la Petite Afrique 
Fairmont Hairpin of the Monaco Grand Prix
After Jenn’s conference wrapped up, we headed to our Airbnb in Menton, France. We could see some of the structures for the Citrus Festival already up in Menton, but we wouldn’t really see the festival until later in the weekend.
The first event we attended was the flower parade in Nice on the first day of Carnival. There were a lot of people on stilts, crazy costumes, streamers and even a few balloons!
That evening we went through the ‘garden of lights’. It was pretty neat. I didn’t know what to expect and we had been to the Rabechilbi festival last year, so my expectations were not super high. I was pleasantly surprised! This years theme was ‘Des Mondes Fantastiques’.
Our Airbnb was only a block away from Creperie Fleur de Sel. We went there several times over the few days we had in town.
The next day was the Golden Fruit Parade. We had seats in bleachers for both parades we attended. It was great! Now I want seats for every parade!
There were huge, mechanical floats in the parade. The first was a giant grasshopper. At the rear of the machine, they had a pair of women playing electric violins. It was fantastic! The had a huge sound system in the guts of the grasshopper blasting out modern tunes but being played by these two on violin.
Many of the floats going by had people throwing out huge clods of confetti. They do this in Switzerland, too. However, in Switzerland it is taboo to ‘reuse’ the confetti- there is no picking up already thrown confetti. Not in France! All confetti is in play here.
Later in the parade there was a huge mechanical dragon. Even the drivers wore costumes to match the theme of their floats. There were a lot of really great costumes.
We also did a driving tour of the region. It gave us a bit more of an overview of the area. Lots of money in the Cote d’Azur! The water off the coast is beautiful. The weather was nice, and it seemed the sun was always shining. With the nearby mountains, I’d bet there is nice hiking not far off. From the lookout point near the end of our trip, you could see three countries- Monaco just below, France a stone’s throw away and Italy in the distance.
It was really beautiful and it’s hard to beat the food in France. We had great weather but it wasn’t warm. It’d be nice to go back when it’s warm and jump in that beautiful blue water.
fort near Monaco 
Mimosa 
Monaco, France, Italy