Day 4 – Cannes and Antibes

After a busy few days we wanted to give Tom and Izzy a beach day. We drove into Cannes, parked up and headed to the sea and they were straight in the water.

After an hour so they were bored so we went for a walk along the harbour to admire all the beautiful boats and then treated the kids to slushies.

We decided to head into Antibes for the afternoon – which was somewhere Stu and I had never visited before.

^Antibes

We walked along the harbour walls which were full of sculptures and had a wander around the town. It was a beautiful town and somewhere we would easily have spent some more time.

Day 5 – Monaco

Stu and I had visited Monaco before kids and absolutely loved it so I was excited to go back.

On arriving we the parked the car and rushed up the hill to the Palace as we were just in time to watch the changing of the guards. It was a fairly short event but worthwhile seeing and we thought it was funny that once the ceremony was over all the guards came out of the building and piled into a minivan to go back to their barracks. There were piles of cannon balls around the palace which the kids loved playing on and the views over the harbour were spectacular.

^{Changing of the guards and views over Monaco harbour}

We headed down to the harbour to find somewhere for lunch and to have a look at all the boats. We followed the Harbour along until we reached the Japanese garden.  This was our first visit to the garden and it was full of rivers with wooden walkways and stepping stones to play on.

^{Japanese Gardens}

At this point our feet were starting to hurt but we climbed up to Monte Carlo to see the casino. There were so many sports cars parked outside and all the tourists were taking photos of themselves next to the cars!

Our last stop of the day was the Cactus Garden on the top of the hill. It is built into a hillside so provides beautiful views and is full of massive cacti!

^{Cacti Garden overlooking Monaco}

We headed home for a BBQ where Stuart got eaten by mosquitoes!

Day 6 & 7 – Pool day and the Camargue

After a full on day in Monaco, day 6 was spent at our property. We played in the pool, had a BBQ and just chilled. Day 7 was a long day trip to the Camargue – about 2 1/2 hours away. The Camargue is a Western Europes largest river delta and is known for its flamingos and white horses.

We set off at about 8am and headed for Saintes Maries de la Mer – the furthest point from us. Here there was a lovely beach so Tom and Izzy were able to have a play. On route we found an information sign so that we could plan our day and Stu got bitten by another mosquito!

Rather than driving around the lakes we decided to take a small road which cut through the middle of them. The hire car got completely covered in sand and dirt! We stopped off at several viewing points and we were lucky to see a large flock of flamingos flying across the sky.

^{The Camargue}

We finished our day at the beach on the eastern side of the park.

We headed home for our last night before returning to England the following morning.