 ined with cafes and hotels,
both modern and Belle Epoque, museums and posh apartments, the Promenade
des Anglais is a long wide road which runs the
length of the seafront at Nice . You walk across it and you're on the beach beside
an unbelievably blue mediterranean .
The
actual Promenade
des Anglais itself, begins at the eastern end
of Nice by the Jardin Albert I and runs westward towards
the airport - a long way.
The
older and grander hotels of the Promenade
des Anglais were built at the turn of the century.
In most people's eyes, the grandest, with its Empire
and Napol?on decor, is the Negresco.
The building, which is now a national monument, was
built in 1912 by Henri Negresco,
a Roumanian immigrant.
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Before he started the hotel, Henri was director of the
city casino's restaurant - we're talking guests who
were the richest people in the world, the Rockefellers
and the Singers. He wanted his hotel to be a hauts lieux
as well, and had it designed to attract the very top
of the upper crust. As bad luck would have it, World
War I reared its ugly head, and the hotel became a hospital.
N?gresco died shortly after the war, a ruined man.
Once the Americans arrived during the roaring twenties
business soon picked up. Especially once Gerald and
Sara Murphy and their entourage of writers and celebrities
had discovered the pleasures of summer on the Riviera.
There are many more pleasures to be discovered on and
around the Promenade
des Anglais.
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On
the Avenue
des Baumettes, there is the Mus? des Beaux-Arts
Jules.
And,
in a little park on Rue de france just off the promenade,
there is the Mus?e Mass?na named after a local boy who
was made a Napoleonic general. Weary?
Take a short walk back to the beach and enjoy the view
across the bay to the Cap d'Antibes and the fortified
Port Vauban which was built to defend Antibes,
and France, from the Ni?ois.
Lavillier:
La Promenade Des Anglais
Les
vieilles courtisanes au fond des vieux salons Cachees
dans les boas et dans les perles fines Leurs amants
bien ranges dans le bleu des vitrines Degustent les
tziganes et font craquer leurs doigts En attendant
le male qui ne vient plus s'asseoir Des reves d'elegance
et de jambes fumees Ou se melent parfums etoffes
et cigares
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