This morning, we went back to the same boulonnerie as yesterday for their classic breakfast which includes coffee, fresh squeezed orange juice, and a croissant. It is delicious, convenient, and cheap which makes it the perfect breakfast. 

We noticed that it was supposed to rain for part of the morning, so we decided to start the day with a ride through Old Nice on a little train. It was very fun to see the town, but the audio was not very good and was hard to hear over the sound of the train bumping along the cobblestone, so we didn’t learn very much about the city. Even so, we enjoyed the views and the escape from the rain. One thing we did learn is that the sculpture of the man with a square head actually houses the offices of the municipal library. 

Since it started raining harder, we stuck with the theme of the morning and hopped on one of the hop on hop off busses in hopes of seeing more. We rode the bus through Nice and over to Villefranche. It was nice to be able to see more of the city and to see Villefranche from the land, but we were constantly wishing we could be outside and enjoy a nice walk without getting soaked. When the bus returned to the stop we started on, we hopped back off and found a small lunch before climbing up the hill to the Marc Chagall Museum. 

At this point, it had finally stopped raining which made the walk more enjoyable. The museum exhibit was focused on printing and the books he illustrated which included everything from the Bible to the Tempest to poetry. We also spent a lot of time admiring his glass which Stephanie had learned a lot about in her glass class. We both had fun spotting the animals and other designs he had hidden in the large glass panels of the creation story. 

After the museum, we headed back down the hill to the train station and took a short ride to Monte Carlo, Monaco. The ride was gorgeous, on our right was the Mediterranean Sea and to our left was the mountain side and ginormous celebrity villas with stunning gardens. We also loved that it seems like almost all the flowers in the French Riviera are purple. 

When we got off the train in Monaco, we were greeted by a red carpet leading down the hill toward the port. We followed it to an ice cream shop where we each got a cone of Oreo ice cream (what else?) before we set out to explore the city. We wandered past the fancy car stores, jewelry stores, casinos, and huge yachts. While it was clearly elaborate, it honestly felt underwhelming. We did enjoy our walk especially because it was no longer raining. The train back was less easy because it ended up being very crowded since it had become rush hour, but we made it on a train and made our way back to Nice. 

We made it to our hotel and took a few minutes to reorient before heading out for a walk along the promenade to dinner.  We loved our lunch from yesterday so much that we knew we had to go back. We ordered the smoked salmon again and then got a different style of mussels over pasta and finished with a pavlova. Everything was amazing…again. It was definitely the right choice to go back and we loved every bite. It was the perfect last evening in Nice and if anyone visits the French Riviera, we highly recommend that you go to Le Rocher – Chez Mina (even if it means traveling into Nice).