And then we went to Monaco!

After our happy hour shindig at the Irish Pub, Heather and I completed our one and only night in Nice with a stroll through town back to our hostel. Before arriving at Hotel Pastoral we made one very important stop: Monoprix. And we went. to. town. I had decided that I was gonna let it alllll go (and by 'let it all go' I mean the work I've been doing at the gym for a few months... I might actually be a little stronger and fitter now than I was when I got here) and I bought the cookie aisle. I kid you not. We bought Petit Ecolier and madeleines and I don't think Heather or I are the same people because of the eating spree. It was splendid, delicious and TOTALLY worth it. Even the stomachache the next morning. And the stomachache with which I woke up only three hours after hitting the hay. Girl gotta let loose sometime!

We awoke Friday morning to grey skies but good times because we were making our day trip to Monaco!

Helpful things for the Cote d'Azur traveler: get the bus at the Gare Routiere in Nice to get to Monaco. The bus takes 45 minutes, runs every 15 minutes, and costs only one euro. How amazing is that!?!?!

So we arrived in the City of Glitz and, I have to admit, I was feeling very Ocean's Eleven. And twelve and thirteen. Ready to gamble.

But the Monte-Carlo has a HUGE entrance fee and wasn't open, anyway. So we hit up the casino next door to it. After getting looked up adn down by the doorman, and being asked to check our coats, we walked into the glittery casino of slots and wandered around.

Monaco? Not a lot to do except look at excess amounts of wealth and marvel at how people can spend spend spend. So our mini-tour of Monaco didn't take too long and after just a few hours we hopped on our one euro bus and went back to Nice. We spent our remaining time on the Cote d'Azur walking around Nice and taking in some last sights before our train pulled out of the station at 3:55.

I could go into how everything was great until the controle woman came and checked our tickets. This was when she made us pay 35 extra euros due to the fact that I had reduced-rate tickets for a train time I was not allowed to have them for. Buuuuuut that would just get me all riled up inside. Kind of how maybe it's almost like the girl who sold me the tickets wasn't doing her job and giving me the full information on carte blanche and all that. I could also go into how ridiculous it is that their controle machine did not accept 1) my credit card or 2) my debit card (that is French) and then the took all my cash. That was a bad. time. my friend. Go fig that'll happen the one and only time my sister (whom I'm trying to impress with my French language skills and my ability to get around in this country) is here. Arrrgh like whoa.

Then we got back to Avignon, met up with Nicole and we had our last night together in Avignon.
Saturday morning I took Heather to the airport. Not much in life has been harder than watching Heather go through security and walk to her gate.

In conclusion, Heather's visit was amazing and I couldn't have asked for a better time.
Heath, I miss you
lots of love,
emily