Friday 9th May
We fly out of Heathrow at 15:35 which means we don’t arrive at Nice until 7 pm. We decide to do a bit of shopping for a meal tonight rather than go out for dinner and shop in the morning. At Leclerc the shop is winding down as we arrive at 7:45 but the car park is still fairly full. As usual we spend more than €100 on what seems very little.
Saturday 10th May
All the reports from home in London tell of a heatwave with the temperature around the mid-20s. Whereas here it is only 18ºC, but it isn’t raining. The fact that it’s dry makes such a huge difference to my enjoyment of La Colle and our stay. When it’s pouring with rain you can’t entertain yourself by a walk along the front or up in the hills.
Today we decided to take a trip down to Antibes and parked up near the beach at Plage du Ponteil. Plenty of people sunbathing and playing on the sand. Neither of us had bothered to bring our costumes so we just strolled past slightly subdued by the sight enthusiasm of youth.
We only wanted a snack for our lunch and so we popped into a restaurant along the road skirting the sea called 59 Brasserie. I had their spaghetti carbonara which came with two uncooked eggs sat amongst the pasta. I turned them over to mix with the bacon and cheese and enjoyed a reasonable dish.
We wandered back to the car and then returned to La Colle
Sunday 11th May
We had received another invitation to Jilly and David’s house for lunch. We have visited their house 3 times and they have never arrived at our place, so felt a little guilty accepting the invite. We knew that Madeleine and Tom would also attend plus another couple. We had supposedly met them before but I didn’t recognise them and I’m sure they didn’t know us. The guy, Peter, a Dane, had plenty to say but his female companion didn’t feel fully at home with English said very little at the table. However I did see her talk quite animatedly to Edda, the final member of the party.
Maggi had bought 8 small cakes to bring as a present. However when she told Jilly about the cakes Maggi was instructed not to bring them, Madeleine and Peter and his partner had organised cheese and a pudding between them. We therefore scrambled around to look for something suitable to bring along with our bottle of wine. We walked down into La Colle and found the honey/bee shop open and bought a present of soap.
I enjoyed the conversation around the table. The Bests had organised it so that the French speakers would be at one end and the native English at the other. Madeleine had the privilege of sitting with the French. I understood that Jilly cooked and David poured the wine. The food tasted great. We started with asparagus wrapped in prosciutto and then slow cooked lamb shoulder that fell of the bone.
I couldn’t tell you now what we talked about but everyone seemed to have a story to tell.
The party broke up just before 5 and Maggi drove back to La Colle.
In the evening I watched Arsenal play Liverpool at Anfield. Arsenal looked the better team, but then let in two quick goals. The gunners went in at half-time 0-2 down and didn’t seem to have much chance of salvaging anything from the match. But football has some odd twists and turns. Arsenal scored twice and looked as if they could go on to win the game., but before that could happen Merino, already on a yellow card committed a rash challenge and Arsenal were now down to 10 men and hanging on to save the point. Fortunately they re-organised themselves and left Anfield with a draw.
Monday 12th May
Pottered around the house and did nothing to report except visit Fanny at Orpi our estate agents. She had complained that she hadn’t had enough visits because the property price exceeded market expectations. We agreed to drop the price from €980K to €920K. She seemed happy with that. If we don’t get a sale by September I think we’ll take it off the market until next year.
Tuesday 13th May
Set off for Cap Ferrat for a walk after breakfast and our morning routine of yoga and shower. Found a parking space on the Cap and then walked down to the port. We stopped at the corner of L’Avenue De La Liberation facing the port for a drink. Maggi had a large coffee and I chose a Perrier. Surprisingly the Perrier at €5 was more expensive than Maggi’s large cafe crême.
Our walk didn’t work out as easily as we expected. A couple of wrong turns meant that we didn’t follow the path we expected. You can see from the map below how we moved back and forward. We returned to the car via the same cafe and left just as the parking warden approached our car.
On the tour you can see some of the most expensive homes in the world. It makes me wonder how much money some of these owners have. I always feel that I’m lucky to have what we have, but the people who own the large properties on the Cap are in a completely different league, that it’s difficult to imagine what their life is like. In some ways I envy them but in others I think that so much money must also be a burden. Anyway I am not striving to change my circumstances and make any more money. Maggi and I are just going to spend the money we have and leave some for the kids.
