So, it’s now been just over a week since I (Laura) got back from the beautiful Cote d’Azur.

I have wanted to visit the French Riviera for a long time and seeing as it is only a short and fairly cheap journey from the UK, it was an easy place to tick off my bucket list.

That plane journey there was the cheapest part of my trip.

The South of France is expensive. A relatively small piece of coastline sitting pretty on the Mediterranean, it starts past Marseille and ends at the Italian border. According to my guide book, this strip of sparkly sea and palm trees was a popular playground in the 19th Century for rich British and Russian people looking for some Vitamin D. Not a lot has changed.

We landed in Nice and immediately found the Promenade des Anglais (‘the Walkway of the English’), which stretches up and down the beach. Predictably, there was just a lot of English people walking up and down it. We decided to try a bit harder and finally reached the old town in Nice, which is beautiful. Pastel coloured buildings, big tall palm trees and lots of cafes, there are lots of small squares to visit. I’d definitely recommend visiting the Place Rosesetti, which is in the centre of the old town, and Place Garibaldi.

After an afternoon there we headed out to our first hotel in Mougins, a village set back off the coastline. I’ve already reviewed this hotel so I’ll just quickly mention the area.

I would definitely recommend visiting these smaller villages that are scattered across the pine forests of the Cote d’Azur. There are so many in this region that we couldn’t visit them all, but they definitely have some pros over places such as Cannes (lots of burnt tourists and men wearing T-shirts that say: ‘I Love Cannes’, snort). One village definitely worth visiting is Saint-Paul-de-Vence, a medieval town set on a rocky cliff top. Apparently it was a popular place for French actors to waft around during the 60’s and today there are still a lot of artist’s galleries. There are paintings and sculptures everywhere, which gave the place quite a cool feel.

Later on in the week we moved to the other side of the coastline, near Monaco. Monaco didn’t seem to be much to write home about – fast cars, big yachts, all crammed into a little horseshoe bay. My day began by changing into my ‘smart’ clothes behind our car in a hot multi-storey car park and ended with my boyfriend having to ‘go native’ and pee behind a bush in the park, as apparently rich people don’t need public toilets. Needless to say, I’m not sure we were quite at home there.                                 

Instead, I would recommend heading past Monaco and crossing into Italy. There are so many towns across that coastline and we stopped at San Remo. I imagine in its heyday, San Remo was a little more glitzy. However, if you scamper up the hilly roads to the very top, it has some beautiful views. Plus loads of pizza – what more do you want?!

Our week in the French Riviera cost nearly the same as our trip to Jamaica last year. Is it worth it? Probably. The coastline is beautiful, the weather is amazing and the big grand yellow and pink buildings that grace nearly every town make the Cote d’Azur everything you think it’ll be -elegant, sophisticated and pretty lovely.