Menton, France Trip: July 15-16

Tuesday and Wednesday were spent relaxing at the beach and exploring Menton. After our tiring day of traveling to Nice on Monday, we decided to lay low before Brian arrived Wednesday evening.

People continued to stare at us. And the beach continued to get crowded. But we went anyway. The weather was gorgeous and Marion was really enjoying herself.

So much so she hated that I pulled her out of the water to put some more sunblock on her back. This was the result of my trying to protect her from the sun.
Imagine lots of crying and yelling, "I want pool!" when you look at that picture.

Our Wednesday morning trip to the beach was cut short due to sunblock in Marion's eyes. She wasn't complaining about it, just rubbing her eyes in the water. So we pulled her out and started back to our rental for lunch and a nap.
We, luckily, found a better way to walk to the flat and took that route. Up (another) flight of stairs but definitely more manageable than the old route.

Brian arrived around dinner time after a flight into Nice and a train ride into Menton. We had dinner then headed out to explore Menton a bit.

The street we were staying on in Menton was under construction. Everytime we walked down in I was in awe of the situation. Let me explain.

The street was being repaved because the sewage piping was being replaced. So imagine an active construction site with portions of the street missing
construction equipment in use
and various pieces of plywood covering numerous openings in the street.
Add the sweet smell of sewage and you can understand why I was shaking my head everytime we walked through this. Can you imagine this scene in the US? The liability insurance alone is enough to make your head spin. I wonder how fast someone would sue the construction company if this was done there...

Anyway, we ended up at the carousel in Menton after navigating the construction zone. To say Marion enjoyed it would be an understatement. She adores "horsies" as she calls them. So we bought her some rides and let her go to town.

The nice woman running the carousel tried to show Marion how to get her airplane to go up and down.
It worked, once or twice, and then she stopped. She didn't need it to enjoy herself.

After the carousel, we stopped to get some ice cream and then headed back to the apartment. Marion crashed (seems going to the beach tires her out) and Colleen, Brian, and I drank some wine, played some cards, and discussed our plans for going to Monaco the next morning.