So, my third trip of the year took me and some friends to the lovely, serene and relaxing location of South of France! A place known for its beautiful beaches, towns, landscapes and great climate.
It wasn’t a place I was intrigued to go to, but once my friend suggested it as a place for our girl’s trip, I thought why not! It was definitely a great choice, and I would advocate for everyone to visit there at least once in their lifetime.

We were there for a total of 5-6 days and did a lot during our time there! (I swear we were averaging around 15k steps a day whilst there!) So, whilst I can’t mention every single thing we did, in order to keep the blogpost to a reasonable length, I’ll be highlighting my favourite parts of the trip, alongside some tips for travelling there!

Chateau Grimaldi – Cagnes-Sur-Mer

As we arrived in the late evening we were on an immediate hunt for some good food, so one of the lovely hotel workers suggested we go up to the Chateau Grimaldi where they have a few restaurants up there. As it was late at night, we weren’t able to see the spectacular view over Nice, we did however enjoy some really good pizzas from a nearby restaurant (Le Jimmy’s). I really liked how all the restaurants up there and pretty much everywhere else in Nice had outdoor seating because of how nice the weather was- London could never!
The next morning we headed back to the Chateau Grimaldi early the next morning to capture some of the spectacular views and it truly was spectacular! It overlooks many hills and mountains over Nice and we definitely made sure to take a peek at some of the houses and villas there, and dream of what our realities could be if we moved here lol!
The Chateau Grimaldi also houses the Grimaldi Castle Museum which if you’re a history nerd like me, would give you much excitement! It was unfortunately closed so we couldn’t go inside, but the view of the castle itself did it justice. I would highly recommend visiting!

Nice Boat Trip – Nice
So on our first full day, we travelled to Nice for a 1-hour sightseeing cruise to Villefranche Bay. This took us around to view the lovely apartments situated on the hills and mountains of Nice, viewed the old town of Nice called Vieux and explored the beautiful scenery of Villefranche Bay. What I enjoyed the most about this cruise was that there was a tour guide providing commentary in both French and English (which I’m guessing is normal for cruises to have?) which gave us insight to what we were seeing, for example our tour guide emphasised houses or villas owned by the likes of Elton John and the Rolling Stones. This was a really fun activity and was also a thrill ride as the waves were really waving!
I would definitely recommend doing an activity like this as South of France in general has loads of islands and small lakes to explore. On the plus side, this was very inexpensive to book, definitely under £20, which I thought was very worth it for 1 whole hour.

Hyde Beach – Cannes

The next day we decided to hit the beach! I was told that Cannes had the best areas for beaches and after looking at countless Instagram stories on where people went in South of France, it seemed like Cannes was the place to go. Cannes is really accessible via train and was roughly 30-40 mins from our area. We decided to go to Hyde Beach in Cannes which is really stunning and definitely has that picturesque scenery for great pictures to post on the gram, unfortunately we didn’t stay there due to them not serving food at the time (which we later learned was the norm for most restaurants and bars in South of France) and we were on a desperate hunt for some calamari! (The things we do for good!)
Instead we decided to dip our feet in the water and had many attempts at trying to recreate that infamous Baywatch run that failed miserably (it’s the vision that counts).

Cannes like a lot of places in the South of France has many areas for walking around high-end shops, we definitely had to stop at a YSL shop and look at the pretty bags and shoes whilst we were there! There are also loads of streets with good food places, so we stopped at Zoa Cannes to grab lunch which was really good! Calamari craving was over!

Monte Carlo, Monaco

Approaching the end of our trip we visited the town of Monaco – literally a place of life and luxury, it’s really how you see it in the movies. Limousines, chauffers and men with women linked on their arms lool. We stopped over at Buddha Bar which literally felt like we were in a Buddhist temple, it had a huge buddha statue upon entering. We then went for a walk around to see Lamborghinis parked around like it was nothing – this place literally captured the saying “in this life have money o!”
I had planned to enter a casino not to play or anything, but just to see what it was like, but they are really strict with ID out there so carrying a passport with you was your best bet. (I learned my lesson, next time I’ll take mine!)

Promenade des Anglais – Nice

The Promenade des Anglais, simply meaning English walkway is a promenade that goes along the coast of Nice. It’s a long walkway consisting of luxury shops, bars, hotels and souvenir shops to purchase all those beloved souvenirs. It’s also right next to the beach which means you could grab food and head right to dipping your feet in the water! Here we stopped by for some lovely Chinese food of course (my fave cuisine) and then headed back to the Promenade to go to Waka Bar, for a night of music, food, a fab view of the open seafront and conversations with some very interesting Nice locals!

Our trip consisted of many more activities and trips to explore, but I’ll keep it to these main highlights for now. Who knows, perhaps I will do a part 2!

Tips:
-Certain towns in South of France are extremely hilly! Getting up to the Chateau Grimaldi felt like a serious hike/pilgrimage until we learnt there are free shuttle buses that take you up there – use them!
-Certain towns are far in distance from eachother, I would advise to stay somewhere central, where it would be easy to get around to all the different towns
-Everyone is super friendly there! It’s a huge contrast to the people in Paris where I feel they are not as welcoming to tourists at times, but everyone is really nice and happy to help. My friends and I concluded it ws to do with the environment and constant sunshine
-Most restaurants don’t open for food until around 7pm, they are very open on nightlife there and only serve drinks during the day
-We took out euros before coming but it isn’t that necessary, almost all shops, restaurants, outlets take card

Thanks for reading!