The Cote d’Azur in the rain-It’s not supposed to be like that!
The previously forecast light rain started as I packed up this morning, bringing to an end the unbroken sun I have enjoyed since starting in Spain, and unfortunately the forecast also does not look promising for the next fortnight. My plan today was to see the French Riviera, and knock Monaco off the list. It was always going to be a challenge driving the van through these areas,and so it proved. The weather was not great for sightseeing, off and on drizzle all day.I was expecting very few places I could stop on a whim, but decided to drive right along the coast road and the main esplanades of all the big name towns, Cannes, Antibes, Nice, Monte Carlo. Those names seem so familiar yet I’d never been to any of them. However ,in the end, the day turned into a very long 185 km drive which took more than 6 hours of continuous and stressful driving to complete.
Things started well with a run from Frejus /St Raphael along the corniche coast road to Mandelieu-la-Napoule, just before Cannes. This part is not built up and you can see the true spectacle of the pine clad mountains and cliffs of dark orange rock tumbling steeply to the sea far below. Along this road there were actually a few laybys and little carparks one could have spent the night in a van without problems-I did see a couple of vans parked up. An amazing view-but nowhere to go beyond the layby.
After the start of Cannes, it was just one long built up area, some places where the road came down to the beach, other places you ran along esplanades past marinas.
Things started to get difficult in Nice.I was happily cruising down the main esplanade, Boulevard des Anglais, when I came to a point where it had been closed. There was some sort of police incident going on, and the diversion led all the traffic into the small streets of old Nice where it became snarled up. I had hoped to stop and see a bit of this old part of Nice but the traffic problems dictated that I set an immediate course for Monaco.It took me ages to extract myself from Nice.in the process, I had a very close encounter with a parked delivery truck while squeezing past ,in a very narrow street, with a queue of traffic behind, and lost a hubcap. Fortunately no other damage sustained. As I wound my way out of Nice I realised that I had completely underestimated how steeply the Alps tumble down to the sea here. It is unbelievable that cities can have grown up in such a vertiginous place. High above me up the cliff I could see the main motorway from France to Italy winding its way along ledges and through tunnels.
Whatever was going on, I don’t know, but there was a CRS (riot squad) policeman or group of police about every hundred yards all along the road to Nice and Monaco, with convoys of police vans ,cars, and bikes coming and going .I got stopped 2 or 3 times by the Police to allow one of their vehicles to pull out or turn around.
It was with some relief that I got into Monaco ,where there was a clear contrast with Nice. The same steeply turning narrow streets ,but none of the back street chaos,here there was quiet traffic ,and a sense that all the buildings were in pristine condition. Nonetheless, there was nowhere to stop.The Police were out here too, in their different style of uniform, with white caps.
At this point I made things more difficult for myself by deciding to head for a free overnight camper spot about 15km north of Monaco, in a small French town of Sospel. When I had earlier plotted likely campsites on the map,this looked as if it was within easy reach of Monaco.Again, what I hadn’t realised was due to the steep tumble of the mountains, this in practice meant an awesome hairpin climb all the way. I had some difficulty with my satnav, as the roads were so tight in Monaco, that often one came to a spiral with branches coming off it at different levels, and it was very unclear from the satnav 2 dimensional image which arm of the spiral to come off at. On one occasion I took the wrong turn on such a loop, and it was 4km of winding road before I could turn around.
Anyway, on reaching Sospel high in the mountains it quickly became clear that the recommended place was a dud, a gloomy spot at the back of a small sports hall. I wrote it off and initiated plan B, which was to head on into Italy where I had noted 2 or 3 campsites on the coast ,pretty much just over the border. To get there involved an even narrower climbing road with multiple hairpins, eventually crossing the border into Italy on a little road high in the mountains. I then descended on a better road, through a pretty much continuous series of tunnels for 8 km. Arriving down on the coast again I was in the first city over the Italian border, Ventemiglia, where if anything the traffic was more crazy than Nice .I went through Bordighera, rather a nasty suburb of Ventemiglia,and not at all the beautiful place suggested in Monet’s painting of the same name, though his picture is mostly of sea and pine trees! It was with some relief that I escaped onto the main coast road, and shortly arrived at my campsite in San Remo.
This was really nice, right on the sea. At the gate, though, I was faced with an unexpected choice, as next to it was a large car park, with places right by the sea, serving as a camper stop, for 15 Euros per night. Using the same logic as yesterday, I went on onto the campsite, which was 18 euros with my discount card. It even has its own restaurant, posh to look at, with the Maitre’d in DJ ,but all a bit of a show really. Nonetheless I had a good cheap meal, a pasta dish ,then swordfish steak and had a chat to some Swiss people on the next table who were staying the whole week there.
The previously forecast light rain started as I packed up this morning, bringing to an end the unbroken sun I have enjoyed since starting in Spain, and unfortunately the forecast also does not look promising for the next fortnight. My plan today was to see the French Riviera, and knock Monaco off the list. It was always going to be a challenge driving the van through these areas,and so it proved. The weather was not great for sightseeing, off and on drizzle all day.I was expecting very few places I could stop on a whim, but decided to drive right along the coast road and the main esplanades of all the big name towns, Cannes, Antibes, Nice, Monte Carlo. Those names seem so familiar yet I’d never been to any of them. However ,in the end, the day turned into a very long 185 km drive which took more than 6 hours of continuous and stressful driving to complete.
Things started well with a run from Frejus /St Raphael along the corniche coast road to Mandelieu-la-Napoule, just before Cannes. This part is not built up and you can see the true spectacle of the pine clad mountains and cliffs of dark orange rock tumbling steeply to the sea far below. Along this road there were actually a few laybys and little carparks one could have spent the night in a van without problems-I did see a couple of vans parked up. An amazing view-but nowhere to go beyond the layby.
After the start of Cannes, it was just one long built up area, some places where the road came down to the beach, other places you ran along esplanades past marinas.
Things started to get difficult in Nice.I was happily cruising down the main esplanade, Boulevard des Anglais, when I came to a point where it had been closed. There was some sort of police incident going on, and the diversion led all the traffic into the small streets of old Nice where it became snarled up. I had hoped to stop and see a bit of this old part of Nice but the traffic problems dictated that I set an immediate course for Monaco.It took me ages to extract myself from Nice.in the process, I had a very close encounter with a parked delivery truck while squeezing past ,in a very narrow street, with a queue of traffic behind, and lost a hubcap. Fortunately no other damage sustained. As I wound my way out of Nice I realised that I had completely underestimated how steeply the Alps tumble down to the sea here. It is unbelievable that cities can have grown up in such a vertiginous place. High above me up the cliff I could see the main motorway from France to Italy winding its way along ledges and through tunnels.
Whatever was going on, I don’t know, but there was a CRS (riot squad) policeman or group of police about every hundred yards all along the road to Nice and Monaco, with convoys of police vans ,cars, and bikes coming and going .I got stopped 2 or 3 times by the Police to allow one of their vehicles to pull out or turn around.
It was with some relief that I got into Monaco ,where there was a clear contrast with Nice. The same steeply turning narrow streets ,but none of the back street chaos,here there was quiet traffic ,and a sense that all the buildings were in pristine condition. Nonetheless, there was nowhere to stop.The Police were out here too, in their different style of uniform, with white caps.
At this point I made things more difficult for myself by deciding to head for a free overnight camper spot about 15km north of Monaco, in a small French town of Sospel. When I had earlier plotted likely campsites on the map,this looked as if it was within easy reach of Monaco.Again, what I hadn’t realised was due to the steep tumble of the mountains, this in practice meant an awesome hairpin climb all the way. I had some difficulty with my satnav, as the roads were so tight in Monaco, that often one came to a spiral with branches coming off it at different levels, and it was very unclear from the satnav 2 dimensional image which arm of the spiral to come off at. On one occasion I took the wrong turn on such a loop, and it was 4km of winding road before I could turn around.
Anyway, on reaching Sospel high in the mountains it quickly became clear that the recommended place was a dud, a gloomy spot at the back of a small sports hall. I wrote it off and initiated plan B, which was to head on into Italy where I had noted 2 or 3 campsites on the coast ,pretty much just over the border. To get there involved an even narrower climbing road with multiple hairpins, eventually crossing the border into Italy on a little road high in the mountains. I then descended on a better road, through a pretty much continuous series of tunnels for 8 km. Arriving down on the coast again I was in the first city over the Italian border, Ventemiglia, where if anything the traffic was more crazy than Nice .I went through Bordighera, rather a nasty suburb of Ventemiglia,and not at all the beautiful place suggested in Monet’s painting of the same name, though his picture is mostly of sea and pine trees! It was with some relief that I escaped onto the main coast road, and shortly arrived at my campsite in San Remo.
This was really nice, right on the sea. At the gate, though, I was faced with an unexpected choice, as next to it was a large car park, with places right by the sea, serving as a camper stop, for 15 Euros per night. Using the same logic as yesterday, I went on onto the campsite, which was 18 euros with my discount card. It even has its own restaurant, posh to look at, with the Maitre’d in DJ ,but all a bit of a show really. Nonetheless I had a good cheap meal, a pasta dish ,then swordfish steak and had a chat to some Swiss people on the next table who were staying the whole week there.
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