Getting here meant 30 hours in transit with a three year old. He did pretty well, though there's a certain level of exhausting paranoia necessary when you take an adventurous child through an international airport.
We spent a few hours in Dubai airport, which appears to be a massive duty free shop designed by someone with far too much money.
This is a stone waterfall / fountain, next to the main elevator bank in the 'A' terminal. You can see the curving roof overhead - from outside, the whole building appears to be a tube lying in its side.
And outside it's over 40 degrees and muggy as hell. The minute it took to climb from the bus into the plane convinced me that I really didn't want to live there.
But we finally landed in Nice, which is a gorgeous French seaside city.
Nice used to be Italian and it still has that shabby-chic Italian feel to it. The buildings are all beautiful, painted in lovely colours, but perhaps they're about due for a new coat?
We went down to the "beach" and had a swim in the afternoon.
It's pebbly rather than sandy, so the locals swim with mesh shoes on.
The water is beautifully warm and it seems saltier than Australian waters - it tastes that way, you seem to float more easily, and after drying off you're coated with a visible rime of salt.
The beach was absolutely packed - this is the French Riviera after all, the preferred swimming hole of a whole continent.
We just went to the scummy free public beach part. But you can hire a spot on the private area, with a banana lounge and umbrella, and order drinks from the waiter.
After dinner, I wandered around the neighbourhood of our little apartment. The streets often meet at strange angles, so it's easy to lose your sense of direction if you don't take care. But it also means there are lots of picturesque laneways to discover, stacked with groovy shops and restaurants.
This is typical. Note the mime outside the police station, probably fresh out of the cells.
Looks like fun. If I liked international travel at all, I'd be jealous. But I don't, so you can keep it! Have fun.
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