It’s another beautiful day here in the Mediterranean. It’s Saturday and today we visited the Cote de Azur of France, known as the French Riviera. Today’s port was Cannes.
Back in the day of the Roman Empire, this area was called “Cane Harbor” by the Romans because of the abundance of reeds in nearby marshes. Cannes today is the crown jewel of the French Riviera. This seaside resort was no more than a small fishing village until 1834 when Lord Brougham, a British Lord Chancellor, visited. He could not get to Nice because of a cholera epidemic, but he found Cannes so pleasant that he built a house there and returned for the next 34 years. By the late 1940’s, it was the site of the International Film Festival and the resort of choice of many wealthy visitors.
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| View of Cannes from the ship |
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| Over view of Cannes from the "old town" |
I had read that a good way to see the Cannes was to take the little “petit train” that circles around the city. Definitely designed for the tourists, it was a bit dorky, but it did provide us with a good overview of the city and a little of the history.
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| The tourist train |
After the ‘train ride” we walked along the waterfront, past the harbor area with yachts and sailboats, and then to the building that hosts the Cannes Film Festival. Like Hollywood, there are handprints and signatures of movie stars encircling the building. Many of them were unknown to us, but we did find the handprints of Cameron Diaz and Julie Andrews.
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| Harbor filled with sailboats and yachts |
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| The Cannes Film Festival theatre |
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| Cameron Diaz handprint and signature outside the Cannes Film Festival building |
The waterfront is filled with expensive designer shops and luxury hotels. The Riviera has long been noted for its beautiful coastline and quaint villages. Even more important for artists, however, are the clarity of the air and the vividness of the colors. The entire region has been home to many artists who have done some of their best work here. Claude Monet felt the quality of light helped him to produce some of his greatest impressionist works.
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| Luxury hotel |
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| The Carlton luxury hotel on waterfront |
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| Missing our little grandson, Enzo |
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| People are still enjoying the beach in late October |
We made a short day of it in Cannes and headed back to the ship to catch up on the blog and to rest up for tomorrow, when we arrive in one of our most looked-forward-to ports…..Barcelona!
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| View from the ship of sailboats in harbor having a race |
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