How we spent both national holidays

July 4
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Our first fete was actually pretty interesting. July 4 is just a regular work day here, but after work, we rushed home so we could catch the train to Cannes. We had been invited to a party that night by some people we had met in Antibes, a group that gets together for meals, drinks, picnics, etc.

The meeting place was at a bar near the old town of Cannes. We had some drinks and met some new people who had come along for the event. Kevin sat down next to this young French guy who had been to the U.S. (Seattle) and wanted to ask lots of questions. His English was excellent. So Kevin did his best ambassadorial duties and ended up speaking to the guy for quite a while! The guy was very friendly, and ended up coming to the party with us.

After our drinks, we went up the road to this old villa built on the side of the hill overlooking the Cannes marina. This place is a castle that can be rented out for events. Check it out here: Suquet Castle.
(If you look at the picture, find the cathedral in the middle, and look down to the left, you can see the tower on the house, just below the first tree.)

It was a potluck, so we had brought some food and drinks. The party was very "posh"--lots of beautiful French people looking over their noses at us, but we all just chatted amongst ourselves and had a good time. We met the owner of the house, and he was very friendly.

Then we were invited to go up to the tower. 3 words...OH MY GOD. The view was absolutely and in all other ways stunning. Definitely a multi-million euro view. We had almost a 270 degree view of Cannes, including the port and all the lights. It was a pleasantly warm night, with just a slight cool breeze blowing. Even if we had brought our camera, it wouldn't have captured it. Kevin decided that he was just going to move there and would come up with some sort of explanation when they found him.

We also met a Belgian woman who had lived in Cannes for 15 years, in a little house in the old town. She had actually been to Pacifica!!! We just about fell OFF the tower at that point. Her sister lived there for a while, and she remembered how cold it was during the summer. Small world!

July 13/14
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Our apartment is directly across the street from the main fire station in Antibes. We noticed signs going up a few days before for the "Bal de Pompiers" on the 13th.

Way back when, the night before the French stormed the Bastille (actually pronounced, "Bastee"), they made a first attack there with torches and stuff, but were driven back by the king's soldiers. So somehow since then, the firefighters, in relation to the torch thing, throw a party. Go figure.

We walked over that night and had a look around. The fire yard is a big open area surrounded on 3 sides by the equipment buildings. They had blocked off about a 1/3 of the yard, and on the rest they set up chairs and tables, and had a DJ and food and drinks. We didn't know anyone, and only a handful of people were dancing, so we came home. Although we were able to hear the music all night, so that was kind of nice. We saw fireworks from our balcony, which were set off at the southern end of town.

July 14 was a day off work, and we didn't leave the flat ALL DAY. Nice and relaxing. The weather was perfect, not too hot, but we honestly couldn't face all the crowds at the events scheduled for the day. So we stayed in.