Antibes

Why Antibes? I was thinking of staying in either Nice or Cannes, both nearby to Antibes. When I discussed this pleasing dilemna with my friend Pascale, she suggested we stay in Antibes, describing it as cozy with a beautiful old town. Then she showed me some pictures from her trip there and I was sold.

The next "issue" was finding somewhere to stay. There are many B&Bs in the area. We like B&Bs better than hotels because we can go to the common areas after Eliot goes to bed and are not stuck reading in the bathroom. After I process this whole year, I am going to write a book called, "Reading in the Hotel Bathroom and other Tales of Traveling with a Toddler." I chose this B&B from a number of seemingly good ones. When we were looking for it from the street I was growing very skeptical because it was in an unexciting neighborhood of modern residences. Then we found the gate and drove in and found it. It was great. The owner knew all about how to make Eliot happy and seemed to genuinely like him. I know a lot of hosts feign liking children to get in good with the parents, but her affectionate glances at Eliot's curly head seemed very genuine to me. And - there were two cats, one of which had a definite fondness for bread and came visiting every morning at breakfast, which we ate outside. The host is an amazing gardner (helped somewhat by the condusive climate) and we just enjoyed looking at the flowers and trees each morning while rebuffing the bread-seeking kitty. Amber and Jade do not eat bread so I just felt wierd about giving a cat bread. Another amusing thing about this B&B is that the staircase was packed with knick knacks, nearly all of which prompted a, "What's that?" from Eliot. Our nightly trip up the stairs went like this:
Eliot: "What's that?"
Me: "A donkey."
Eliot: "What's that?"
Me: "A hat."
Eliot: "What's that?"
Me (getting out of breath from carrying a 30 pound toddler up 3 long flights of stairs): "Eliot, what is that?"
Eliot: "A pig."
And so on.
Sometimes I know he knows what "that" is. He just likes asking the question.

So, we got to do a lot of fun things in Antibes. We made sure Eliot had lots of time for beach play. He runs into the water, scoops up sand with his blue shovel, which is vastly preferable to his red shovel for some reason. (The red shovel is inevitably for Mommy.) Then he runs as though on a critical mission to another location on the beach and deposits the sand. This busy activity can go on for some time and is very amusing to watch. He builds sand castles with Chris and gets mad at the water if the tide dares come too close. Now I know why families with young children like the beach. It is easy to spend time with Eliot on the beach. He could spend the whole day there and never get bored.
And neither could I in Antibes. Looking at the blue, blue water and viewing boats, or the old town, or the mountains were really nice.

The area had lots of playgrounds, too. Eliot insisted on playgrounds each day and we happily indulged him. I am amazed at how his "gross motor" skills have improved this year. He tackled this climbing structure no problem! Great views from the playgrounds, too.