A day in Italy.

Liz had uni and exams all day today, so I took a little adventure to Italy. Just across the border, about 45 minutes by train from Nice, is Ventimiglia. And they have markets on Fridays. DOUBLE WIN!

I caught the 10:30am train to Ventimiglia and got off right in the middle of a bustling town. It's only a small village, but being on the coast, it's absolutely beautiful, and so was the weather. The markets were a lot bigger than I expected too, covering pretty much half of the town. I bought some local delicacy biscuits and started to explore. First purchase: silk printed harem pants. WOOH! They feel so comfortable on! I bought some other small things, but nothing too big. After the markets, I went into the old Medieval town at Ventimiglia. It was so cool! Like a more traditional Italian village. But with an amazing view!

Such a weird landscape

On the train

View of Monte Carlo on the train

Arriving in Ventimiglia

Walking to the markets

Fresh food markets

So much good food!

The markets

The markets with the medieval village behind. Old

Ventimiglia

Old Ventimiglia

At the markets

Me!

The I found the sewing market stall...

Ventimiglia park

In the park

Town square

So much pasta!

Old medieval town behind

Crossing the bridge

New Ventimiglia

Entering Old Ventimiglia

Bought pants at the markets

360: http://360.io/arcsZA

I'd heard of another town about 20 minutes by train away called Sanremo. I thought it was the home of Sanremo pasta, so I decided to save lunch for there in the hope of getting some amazing ravioli or something. I hopped a local train there (it is such a good feeling when you can navigate your own way around a country's local transport system, especially when they don't speak any of the same languages as you. This was actually my first time speaking/being spoken too in Italian) and arrived at about 2:30pm. The town was not what I had expected. It was pretty much just a normal town, again with a really nice view, but nothing special about it. And no pasta-ey looking restaurants. I headed down to the marina in search of anything and came across one with a bit of a view. Not being a massive seafood fan, I opted for the beef beats. I was heaps excited. Beef beats served on a bed of lettuce and toasted bread! Then it came out, and it was raw haha. France has their own version of this dish, but there's comes out looking like a volcano with the raw mince around the outside and a cracked raw egg in the middle and spices and herbs around the outside. You then mix it yourself into a kind of raw beef patty, and that's how you eat it. I haven't tried it yet for fear of getting sick as I'm a well done kind of girl, and it's never sounded that appetising before. But this must have been the Italian version and was just raw mince beef on a bed of rocket leaves, toasted bread and balsamic vinegar. Being a little shocked, I wondered about the most polite way to send it back and ask for it to be cooked haha. But I'm only in Italy for the day, and I've been eating rarer and rarer meats since I've been in France, so I decided to just go with it. It wasn't as bad as I thought. I took it slow, so to not get sick. But the taste was alright. And I knew the meat would be fine as I was in a good restaurant. When I was finishing, it started to pour. So, rather than sitting around in Sanremo looking for pasta, I hopped a train back to Ventimiglia. Unfortunately, I didn't know that you can't just buy a train ticket, you have to validate it as well in Italy. So when the ticket man came around, I was fined 5 euros for not having a validated ticket. My first ever fine! And in Italy. What a baddie!

Lunch!

At the restaurant

Sanremo marina

View from the restaurant

My fine for not validating my ticket!

I pulled back into Ventimiglia with enough time to buy a ticket to Nice and make that train. But got stuck in the line behind a lady who had bought tickets and missed her train by 3 hours, so was arguing the point of why she should have them exchanged. I missed that train. The next one was half an hour, so I walked back into the fruit markets and picked up some apples for the ride home.

Train ride home

House for sale...

Arriving back in Nice, the weather was still nice, so I made my way up to the famous lookout where all of the view photos of Nice are taken from. The view was incredible, and there was also a small park with multiple lookouts at the top including of the other side of Nice. I met a group of people up there who originally thought I was taking photos of them, but was actually using my 360 panoram app. They gave me their email addresses and asked me to send them the link to it. I also got hit on by a sweet Irishman whose dog kept coming over to me to throw his stick. There's a lovely waterfall at the top as well which was refreshing in the heat and after the climb.

Nice cathedral

Town square during the day

Towards the lookout

Waterfall at the lookout

Archeological site at the lookout

Park at the top

From the lookout

Here's some more 360's: http://360.io/Qs98qk
http://360.io/q6tBDW

I headed back down at about 7pm, with Liz finishing her exam at 7:30pm. On my way back, I got stuck talking to an old lady who was selling beautiful watercolours of Nice that her husband was painting. I would have bought one if I could get it home, but I can't :(

We went to a club/pub later that night and went to bed at about 1:30am.