Travel: France 🇫🇷 | Aug, 2023

We started planning for this trip from May. I already had a visa for France as earlier my plan was to visit there with family. Unfortunately due to some personal reasons that trip got cancelled. My college friends and me were already planning a trip to Phuket but there was no active action being taken on it. That’s the time I started convincing people that we need to go for a better trip. We need to make an exquisite trip maybe to Europe or something, Phuket seems like a too mainstream destination now. Gladly enough my privileged friends found sense in my argument and agreed to visit Europe. That’s how the entire strategy planning for France trip begun.

The amount of excitement that goes into planning such huge trips is insane. There were days wherein planning for this trip was the only good thing in my day. We prepared a rough budget and itinerary for the trip, pre- booked few travel and sight seeing activities. We had setup a weekly meeting to plan this and it was super fun.

We were supposed to leave for Nice on Friday (11th Aug) and since 2 days before this I was unable to do any kind of work. I was so excited about the trip that it was the only thing I could think about.

Day-1: 11th Aug | Flight to Nice

The flight was at 04:30 am from Mumbai. It was the 1st time I was travelling with Emirates. We had a connecting flight via Dubai and the overall experience was pretty smooth and punctual. We landed in Nice at 2-3pm local time. After completing all the formalities we came out and started looking for ways to get to our airbnb. Our host had told us take Bus 61, which directly reaches the location but the overall design and structure of the airport was very bad and there was no way we could figure out where and when the bus will come and how much will we be charged for this. We finally took a taxi and got to the location. On reaching the location this the 1st thing we saw:

Well i was delightfully surprised and glad that we have selected a decent accom :P as we were going to stay here for the longest!! 5 nights

On entering the Airbnb we all were so happy with the fact that it was just as we saw in the pictures. It had a killer view:

We setup our rooms, got ready and left to visit the Promenade of Nice. This basically means visiting the beach front. It would be an understatement to say that i was completely blown away with the beauty of Nice beachfront. We clicked a few pictures and headed to a beach club to chill for the evening.

We watched the sunset through the promenade and went to a super classy french place for dinner. I still remember the waiter who was everything you can see in movies about french waiter. Everyone was relatively jet lagged and tired so we decided to keep it a small day and go to sleep early.

Day-2: Cannes

The idea of setting up base at Nice was it is located somewhat centrally to visit nearby rivera places conveniently. We had a 30 min train to Cannes at 8am and Cannes s undoubtedly my favourite city in the French Rivera. We started the city tour by hitting the beach.

I was worried earlier about how the water is gonna be (having experienced Goa and Pondi). The sun was consistently shining so it felt obvious to assume the temperature of the water is going to be relatively warmer. As soon as i entered the sea it was soo fucking cold!! It felt like i was swimming in the perfect marriage of ice and fire. After a wonderful 3-4 hours of enjoying the beach we headed for lunch at a nearby on road restaurant. I had no clue i was going to eat the best pizza of my life. Yes, even after being to all the fancy places in France in the later part of the trip, i can for sure say that the pizza i had that day in Cannes was the best pizza of my life. The waiter of this specific restaurant justified why french people are infamous for being rude. He was immensely snooty and had an unjustified attitude. Well, the food more than compensated for this shit show.

We then stepped out to explore the city of Cannes. It is a rich freak city. I am curios to know the per captia income there. We hopped on to the local bus (random bus at a random station) and quickly got the overall city tour. Visited the prestigious Cannes film festival area (red carpet area). Explored the beautiful yachts parked in the bay area. Here is my personal favourite among them XD

After this we went to the promenade area of Cannes and it is easily the most expensive street i have been to. Such expensive cars parked on the roads, such exquisite brand stores all over the place and such grand- expensive hotels hovering over the roads. It felt small and poor just walking by.

I remember asking myself what the fuck these people do in their lives that they make so much money!! And what are we even doing with our lives. I had expected this behaviour from Monaco but Cannes just hit a home run with its elite vibe. After completing a walk by the beach and admiring others' money we watched the pretty sunset over Cannes' waters and had dinner at a random roadside food truck. (our budget for the day was exhausted :P). We boarded our train back and got back to Nice at around 11pm. One strange thing that happened was: Nice arrived and we were all standing at the door for the doors to open. The train was stopped and i feel like it was very natural for us to assume this. Apparently some trains in Europe are still wired in a way that you have to press a button on the door for it to open and it is not automated. We were about to miss our platform if it wasn’t for a kind lady to come forward and open the door for us. Well, we all learn something new everyday :)

Day-3: Monaco

We were visiting the city of billionaires and it obviously dawned on us that we need to be appropriately dressed as we also wanted to visit the world famous Monte Carlo Casino. Like before we had a 30-40 mins train to Monaco. We started by having breakfast in the city.

By this time we had started having breakfast at supermarkets. We would visit the nearest supermarkets and buy something ready to eat and budget friendly. We clicked many photos with the city backdrop and then got into the Hop-on Hop-Off bus which gives a city tour. This cost a whooping 23 euros. There were 12 main stops which were to be visited. So we decided we will take one entire round explore what all is there and then in the second round we will stop at the places we find attractive. While waiting at the bus station this was the casual ad being displayed there, which gives you a good sense of what kind of city you are visiting. "Flying Private"

After visiting 3-4 stops we finally reached the Prince's palace of Monaco. There the bus driver told us at around 12:30pm a parade happens at the gate of the palace and it shouldn’t be missed. So we got down at this stop and patiently waited for the parade to start along with many other folks. Needless to say the parade was a very big disappointment and what seemed like a failed attempt to replicate London's famous Changing the Guard. We headed to the old town of Monaco through narrow alleys that opened in the palace foreground, had our lunch there and quickly got on the bus to complete the city tour.

Next stop was Monte Carlo casino- the birth place of Poker. The cars in the parking were insane and we didn’t know if we will even be allowed to go inside. We went inside with full confidence, the guards did a quick security check and let us inside. We however couldn’t go inside the playing area of casino as it was required to carry your original passport. With most of the city covered we decided it was time to head back. It was still early so we decided to stop at a random town: Ville Franche. On our train to Monaco in the morning all of us liked this town, it had stunning views. We got off the at the Ville Franche station and took a nie walk around the town. It was a small traditional European town where people had no fucks for the outside world and just wanted to chill and enjoy in life.

This was the view to which we were sipping beer with our legs dipped in the super cool sea water and mild sunlight flashing over us.

We had a beautiful dinner at a seaside restaurant with good wine and once it was dark enough, decided it was time for us to head back to Nice. We got in the train and decided to head out for clubbing in Nice. The train to Nice was super crowded and so we split in 2 groups of 2 each. We agreed to get down at the Nice- Ville station. Me and my friend sitting with me got down at the designated station however we couldn’t see our friends around on the platform. They were maybe sitting 1 compartment ahead of us. We called them, no one answered. Just about when the train doors closed, we saw them running towards the exit doors from their seats. Unfortunately it was too late by then and the train started moving ahead with our group split in half. This seems like a good time to introduce our internet scene. Of the 4 people only 2 people had constant internet access and the other two relied upon hotspot from these people. Now luckily one person from both the groups had that constant internet access but it does daunt me what would have happened if those 2 who didn’t have any net access had gotten together!

Anyway we established contact with those two and decided to meet at a bar in the old town. For us it as a 1.5km walk and in the spirit of killing time by the time those guys get there, we decided to walk that bar. I must say it was of the most scary 20 mins of my life. The streets were completely deserted, it was quite dark, random people occasionally were popping up at turns. With what was going on in France in the very recent past, our fear was reasonable. After an hour or so our friends got at the bar and we had a few drinks and headed back to the airbnb as everyone was pretty darn tired now.

Day-4: St. Tropez

While all the places we visited till now were pretty close by to Nice and had good connectivity, St. Tropez was little far off and hence we had rented a car.

This satisfied our urge of road trip in Europe as well as gave us a different experience of travelling. I had gotten my international driving permit beforehand and we rented a sweet electric vehicle for the same. In retrospect however it feels like we should've rented a non- electric car as none of us were aware of how to charge the vehicle.

Anyway the drive started and soon enough we were blazing through the highways of France. After the battery of the car was down at 75%, everyone thought it is good time to test out charging of the car as we could also get some help at this hour if need be. So we stopped at a Carrefour supermarket which had electric charging in its parking. All 4 of us got down at the charging station. There were 4 charging points and 3 were occupied. With the drivers of these cars possibly shopping inside the market. Inspite of spending roughly 30mins there we couldn’t figure out how how to make the payment and enable charging of the car. Giving up, we decided that 2 of us will go inside the market and try to seek help from staff/ anyone who might have knowledge, and the rest 2 will stay near the car in the hope that if anyone from the other 3 cars returns, we will be able to take help from them as they are the best people to seek this kind of help.

We didn’t get any help by going inside the market, in-fact the employees were completely oblivious of how any of this operates add to that the language barrier :)

Mind you this isn’t some mainstream French city where people atleast know little English, this is a random small french town where we stopped to charge our car. The people here had no clue whatsoever about the English language.

Fortunately for us, the people who had stayed back were able to get some help from a fellow electric vehicle driver who had kept her car for charging and then returned to leave. This was the scene we saw when we returned to the car:

We were so relieved now!! The car will finally get charged and we will be able to proceed with our journey now. We waited until the car was fully charged which took roughly about 20mins and proceeded with the journey.

After a few more hours of driving we finally came to the best part of the journey which is driving through the coastal road. Never imagined i will have one of the best drives of my life here. Never imagined that i will be 23 and e driving through the coastal roads in south of France!

I genuinely felt so grateful and blessed at that moment.

As we navigated through St. Tropez, i could literally see how immensely rich the crowd was here. With beautiful mansions left and right of the road to supercars on the roads. We reached Tahiti beach and 30mins into reaching we witnessed 2 helicopters land just about 40 feet behind us! Now you can imagine the scale.

Tahiti beach however seemed very crowded than we expected so after spending some time here we decided to bounce to a second beach Pampelone de Page. This beach was literally the best beach i have been to in my life. I know a lot of things mentioned in this blog come off as one of best in my life, but thats not an exaggeration!! :P

After spending a good amount of time in water we bounced from the beach to explore the city. Well, little did we know that the traffic in this crazy rich city will be so insane that we have to drop that plan and head back to Nice, as otherwise it will be pretty late. I felt like i was in Bangalore again!! There was so much traffic on the way back. It subsided once we got back on the highway. We were due to return the car tomorrow morning at 9am so we thought why not make the most use of this car (typical Indian mindset :P) We thought lets enjoy this car for most part of the night and then we can return it tomorrow. The problem was: our car charge was at 18%. Hence started the exercise of finding the nearest car charge station. It is strange that a city like Nice has so little infrastructure to facilitate this. We nearly went to 3-4 locations multiple kms apart in the hope to charge our car but every location had some or the other problem. One specifc location was of ana abandoned factory, we went quite inside and realised this might turn out to be our "final ride", yes, thats how much shady that area was. Well this was the final location we visited. Our battery was at 10% so we thought better to go to the hotel and return the car tomorrow morning.

What an adventurous and fulfilling day though.

Day-5: Nice

This day was reserved for exploring Nice as we had only visited the city once. It was supposed to be a chill day. We started by having breakfast at a boulangerie-pâtisserie. I can’t describe how massively yummy it was. Here's what our breakfast looked like:

1. Croissants

2. Pain au chocolat

3. Some Apple pie thingy

4. Chocolate quiche type

5. Coffee

6. Tiramisu

We had a beer on the beach and for one final time went into the beautiful waters of South France.

It was now massage time, i have always wanted to explore having massage in europe and today felt like the perfect time. It was meant to be a chill day. We searched for a massage parlour around us and found multiple at walking distances. Not to repeat what i have been saying in this blog but yet again even the massage was one of the best massages i have had. I felt soo relaxed, especially because we were feeling very tired from many days- Walking on an average 20k steps daily, swimming in the ocean, no proper long sleep. So this massage actually came at a very good time. We got home, freshened up and went out for dinner. We had planned to go for a bar crawl in Nice that night. We had dinner at a very cozy place and that street looked like all of the population has stepped out to have dinner.

We walked to the location from where the bar crawl was supposed to begin. Bar crawl basically means we will meet up a random group of 20-30 people, play some introductory and fun games like beer pong, have shots and bounce from 1 bar to another. This will happen with around 4 bars. The transition happened from a very quite bar to a karaoke bar to a normal dancing bar to the most party freak bar at the end. It was great fun meeting and speaking to new people and sharing a common vibe. Most of these people were outside of France. People from Australia, UK etc were there and it was real fun speaking and dancing with them. The party continued upto 2am and we all had a great time. We went home post this as we had to catch an early morning train tomorrow to Lyon.

Day-6: Lyon

We had a very stressful morning, as we weren’t getting cabs, card payment was not getting accepted and then we caught the train with a steep margin of 30 seconds. If we were even slightly late, we would’ve missed our train. And Lyon is quite far, we had to go from south of France to almost central France. We had to change train at Marseille. Getting down on the Marseille train station gave me a god picture of the impending decline of Europe. Garbage thrown everywhere, graffitis made all along the walls, super dirty tracks and long queues everywhere. Around 5 local had recommended us in the earlier days saying to not visit Marseille because it is not safe.

We reached Lyon late afternoon and immediately got to our hotel. It was a far step from the killer airbnb we had for the first few days. It was a very small room bagpacking type of hotel. We rested for sometime and then headed out to explore the city. Lyon is known as the Gastronomy capital of France. It is known for its good food.

We started to explore the city with electric cycles. We installed the tier app, which is like 'Yulu' in the Indian context. On these cycles the major attraction we saw was the confluence of saone and Rhone river.

Post this exploration we decided to eat at the best pizza place in Lyon: Cosy Pizza. It tasted delicious, we were very happy with our choice.

After this we went to the old city of lyon and experienced the quite beauty of this place. The bridges were well lit and the vibe on the shores of the river was entertaining. People had brought picnics, they were having drinks, singing songs. We caught a similar spot on one of these places, sipped some beer and started jamming to some OG old songs. The view from the river shore was stunning and i absolutely loved the European vibe.

The view

Day-7: Paris

We had a 11am train to Paris and got to the station on time. We reached Paris at about 2pm and went straight to buy 3 day metro passes. Even after repeatedly trying to get the passes on ticket kiosks we couldn’t succeed as every-time the payment was failing. We had credit cards + forex cards and the payments were still getting declined. On basic googling we found out that French government is in the process of enabling smart chip credit cards for prevention of frauds. Indian banks have apparently not implemented these improvements in their cards, hence the payments were failing. The only way out right now was to get in the cash queue and then take the tickets. This wasted a lot of our time. Anyway after getting our metro passes we headed straight to our hotel which was right beside one of the metro stations. We left our bags in the hotel and headed straight to the Eiffel tower as we had a booking for today to go on the 2nd floor of the tower followed by a cruise on Siene river.

We 1st ate something at a super fancy restaurant where one of my friends ate a rabbit! I was utterly disgusted at this, but well i can only nag him about it.

We then got to the meeting point from where our Eiffel tour was about to begin. Our tour guide was a columbian who resided in France. We had good skip the line tickets which upon reaching Eiffel i realised were so helpful as the line to get tickets there was just insane. We nicely went to the diagonal elevator (yes diagonal!) that took us up to the second floor. There are 3 levels on Eiffel:

1st floor

2d floor

the ultimate top

As per multiple reviews the best views are visible from 2nd floor and naturally we took those tickets. As we got to the second floor the guide started showing us the famous places we could see from everywhere and also the kick-ass business mastermind of Yusuf Eiffel (the builder of Eiffel tower). The views from there were breathtaking one of the best views i have ever seen.

The place was hella crowded so we could not take a proper picture of ourselves from the top.

Well we decided it was time to go down but as soon as we went to the elevator it was sooo crowded that we decided maybe its time to take the stairs. (Yes there are even stairs!!)

In retrospect it was a very impulsive decision to do so. It took us 10mins to get down, it was very exhausting and most of the people in our group had given up XD. Well everyone of us is just super unhealthy. I don’t remember the count of steps but i do remember it was enough to make us tired.

We got down and went to the Seine river cruise. It was a good decision to take the cruise in the night as it was very breezy and cold. In afternoon, i am not sure if it would have been so pleasant. While on the cruise whenever the cruise goes under any bridge the people standing on top of the bridge yell and wave at you excitedly. The folks in the cruise reciprocate with equal enthusiasm to these people. its an altogether different vibe. On returning from the cruise we got to see an even majestic view of the Eiffel tower.

Ended the 1st day in Paris at a vibrant note.

While the old architecture of the city is very beautiful let me take this moment to bitch a little about the sad current state of the city. The metros are shitty- every station stinks of urine, the trains are immensely crowded, there is an unsafe vibe all over the streets, garbage on the streets, beggars on roads. I was very happy with France but Paris just was so underwhelming as per European standards.

Day-8: Paris

We got up early and had breakfast at boulangerie-pâtisserie Artisan-ale, supposed to be one of the best bakeries there. We then visited the beautiful Arc de triumph - the symbol of French revolution. From there we had a reservation for Louvre museum in the afternoon to see the super glorified piece of art- Mona Lisa.

The entry to the Louvre had such big lines that we thought this is gonna easily take 2 hours. Well, thanks to the education imparted to us by reels we knew a shortcut. While the main door of the Louvre is very crowded it is recommended to go inside from the carousel mall which is just about under the Louvre. So we got inside the mall and that mall has a separate entry to the museum. Which is never so crowded usually.

I really wish we had gotten some more time at the louvre, being a fan of history i was really enjoying the history and paintings/ sculptures there. Unpopular opinion: I liked many paintings lot more than the Mona Lisa. We had to move ahead to visit the PSG stadium and Rolland Garros. Both were very beautiful. We rested on the streets outside Rolland Garros for a bit and started our move to the most exciting evening planned- The Crazy Horse Cabaret Show. We had pre- booked this and we were quite excited to witness this famous Parisian show.

After attending this show- which was very good btw, i came to understand how the entertainment industry was working before internet :)

For everyone visiting Paris this show is a must as part of experience! The show went on for 2 hours.

Tonight was my 24th birthday eve! One of the many reasons to plan the trip during this time specifically. I thought i want to remember the exact time i am turning 24 and in Paris. Earlier we were going to go to a club/ bar but based on my wishes decided that we will go to the Eiffel tower and drink champagne. The plan seemed perfect also because of the fact that exactly at 12am the glittering of Eiffel tower starts. We bought a Champagne bottle and headed to Eiffel in bus.

It was a moment i will cherish forever!! Because how often you are turning 24 and celebrating it with champagne in front of Eiffel tower :)

We went back to. the hotel as it was getting late and Paris does not seem like a safe space nowadays.

Day-9: Paris

This was our last day in France and it was time for the most important thing which was heavily deprioritised till now: SHOPPING. You just cannot be in Paris and not shop, it would be a sin. And there are multiple people for whom you gotta shop- parents/ siblings / friends/ yourself. We started on the Champs-Élysées street which is a hub of all luxury brands. We started by visiting Boss, which seemed like a relatively affordable brand to us. We bought a few items from there and then went to Foot Locker as some of us wanted to get sneakers at low cost. Next stop was Gucci. We had to wait outside the store for 15mins before going in. The store does not allow many people inside at once. We were just exploring the shops with no particular agenda. I had some budget that i had kept aside for my birthday gift. But the prices i heard were just crazy insane. I loved one of the shoes at Gucci on asking the price for it, i was completely shaken- Rs. 75000/-. Thats when it hit me i have grossly overestimated my spending abilities and it is time to leave the store XD

We did stop by at other luxury stores: Louis Vuitton

Michael Kors

Burberry

Ralph Lauren and many others

After shopping for most of the day we decided to go back to the hotel so we can safely keep the bags there. BUT there was one more stop that we ought to take. It had been 3 days in Paris and still we didn’t have the chance to click a proper picture with Eiffel tower in daylight. So we headed there, 3rd time in 3 days and spent about 30 mins clicking pictures with it. Everyone was so exhausted we took a cab to head back.

After resting for a bit we got ready to go out for dinner. We decided to go to Peppe Pizza which has apparently won many awards for being the best pizzeria in Europe and what not. We weren’t sure if we will even get a table there. We decided to take the chance and go there anyway. Luckily we got a table there and the pizza was extremely delicious, totally worth it.

Post dinner we took a nice ride on tier cycles across the main town of Paris and then my birthday ended during the metro ride to hotel.

Day-10: Travel

Whole day was dedicated to getting back home, to India. We had 2-flights : one from Paris to Dubai and the other from Dubai to Mumbai. For me it was one more flight - Mumbai to Aurangabad