... But that would take the fun out of my goaty gloat (oh yes, I just said that). My name is Colin, and these are my French exploits (in photo format because I am so tech savvy).
We began in Beziers, a smallish town that we visited so I could say hi to my buddy, Watto (no, that’s not Tess, it’s Watto as is Mr Water Rat):
We then learnt all about the canal system together, and spent quite a deal of time sitting to watch water flow from between gates. Here’s Trex looking pretty chipper about it all:
However, the discovering the canals in all their glory was our own work. When we arrived at our hotel, the dude running the place could offer us very little advice on what to do about town; because let’s face it, Beziers is a hole – a very pretty hole, where everyone goes to bed at 6.30 pm. He did offer us one tip, and that was to bug the grumpy old dude in the cathedral to let us climb the tower. Some churches demand that God wants pennies for you to climb their tower, but in Beziers, for as little as no dollars, you get this:
Because of the offence the following sign caused Tess Watson, I will refuse to speak about Toulouse, which was our next stop:
I move on to Nimes, “the city with an accent”. Yes, it is in fact Nîmes. It may be a play on words, or it may be the case that Nimes is so chuffed about being the only French town name that uses an accent that it plugs that fact as its catchphrase. Nimes is very Spanish influenced; in their arena bull fighting is quite the popular spectacle. I was invited to partake in one such bullfight during my time here, to which I happily obliged. Decked out in all my finest bullfighting attire, I rocked up to the arena only to learn that they in fact wanted me to act as the bull – the bullfighter was too much of a wuss to fight a bull and they wanted to challenge me.. ME! I was so angry I turned him to stone. Don’t believe me? Well why don’t you head to Nimes yourself to check out the evidence:
And then I had free reign over the entire arena. This was kinda lame because without a fight the crowd didn’t want to stick around:
Then we visited this old thing, the Tour Magne. So get this, this is how stupid humans are. In the 12th Century, Nostradamus had this prophecy: “gleaming metals of the Sun and Moon beneath ancient vestal buildings”. So naturally, the people got to work at destroying old stuff to find shiny stuff. This guy, Francois Traucat, was convinced that the Tour Magne was covering said treasure, so he got permission to do as he liked so long as two thirds of any treasure found went to the king. Guess what he found... Nothing. Stupid humans. So here’s what it looks like in its non-treasure-looted state:
And to prove how stupid humans are in France, check out this sign:
And to further prove my point, why are all the emergency exit hammers of this bus at the front, next to the usual exit:
To their credit, however, the French did come up with this, one of the greatest inventions of all time:
Ok, so the silly photographer focused on the pole, but that hazy dude in the background is riding around of a motorbike with a giant vacuum cleaner on the back to suck up doggie doos! Genius! I left him a nice on just to set up this photo.
Also while we were in Nimes, we made our way out to visit to Pont du Gard, a giant Roman aqueduct that is mighty impressive:
And the only way to make that more impressive to have a photo of only me in front of it:
From Nimes we headed to Cannes, which is the kinda place you can just smell the money in the air. The film festival was a couple of weeks out of the way for the year, which meant the celebrity spotting wasn’t going to be as fun, but the beaches were in top form still. The walk of fame in Cannes was a little random for us, as we knew very little of the so-called “stars” on show. There’s always a priceless one waiting though:
Cannes also seemed to be the home of the biggest killer fulmars I have ever seen. Fulmars are ginormous seagulls that make it their business to kill pigeons (we saw this happen in Spain) and drag as much rubbish out of bins as possible. I’m honestly surprised the Cannes council haven’t issued guns to citizens to wipe the things out. They’re huge and they eat EVERYTHING! Forget vampires, the next horror series is gonna feature giant gulls. You heard it hear first.
Here’s a miniature rant: What’s with all the white clothes stores in the Cote d’Azur!? Seriously, the price tags are super high and the clothes are super bright, but I don’t understand how wearing white makes you any classier than anyone else. Maybe it is just “beachy” stuff, maybe it’s poncy, but it’s sure as heck funny when the white clad families (yes, entire matching families) get caught in an unexpected torrential downpour in Nice!
Here’s where you’ll be shopping:
After Cannes we headed to Nice for out final week of Frenchiness. Nice seemed to be all about the rain, so we hopped out on a few trips to Eze, Antibes and Monaco. Antibes was quite a pretty place, but they really need to catch up with Eze and name something posh after me like they have:
Monaco on the other hand is where I like to head for a few hands of poker (Bond style – yes, I’m a super hero/secret agent on the side, shh don’t tell) and a cruise around the Riviera in my boat:
^^Yes, that one is mine. And if that don’t impress you much (like that mole Shania sang to me that time), how’s about me owning the yellow submarine:
I purchased it from the offices of iTunes for a steal. Or I may have stolen it. Either way Paul loses out this time!
So then I headed to Monte Carlo for a few spins of the wheel:
And then had a lounge because the casino is exhausting:
And then headed back to Nice to sucker-punch Liam to the ground so I could have entire free reign over his blog. Actually, to be honest, I’m quite small – Liam was KO’ed at the thought of having to visit another Euro art gallery and just fell down in defeat:
So, having told you all that now, and with total control over this here post, I present the following run down of the kinds of things I ate in France. If you are not a fan of jealousy, I recommend you stop reading. If you are a fan of jealousy... Uh, you’re weird.
Let me being with this photo, one of the best Boulangeries we found (it’s in Antibes). Baguette hot from the oven and an amazing almond croissant to boot at low prices – yes please!
But the buildings in which you buy this kinda food have nothing on the food itself... I present to you my standard meal in France.
Entree – olives from the market (ridiculously cheap and tasty):
Entree two – chestnut crepe (who says you can’t eat dessert before dinner?):
First main – quiche (with self prepared salad including more olives!):
Second main – citron meringue pie (who says you can’t include dessert as part of your dinner?):
Third main – galette with mushrooms, egg, ham and Provencal tomato – the greatest tomato topping I have ever tasted:
First dessert – homemade caramel crepe (is your mind exploding yet?):
Second dessert – CAKE! Chock full of berries:
And to top all of that off, I present the pinnacle of French pastries: The almond croissant:
And if you think all of this has made me one giant fatty, I will neither confirm nor deny that thought. I will only say that there have been no photos of me since having this meal and there may not be any more for some time to come... I think I need to go for a jog... Oh wait, I’m in Italy, I’ll just go and get a pizza instead!
Hope everyone’s enjoying life as much as I am (bahaha)!
Catch you all very soon no doubt :)
~~Colin
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