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Monday 14th August 2006 - Venice to the South of France

We checked out of our Venice camp site and caught the 11.29 to Milano. From there we took the 15.10 to Nice, arriving at approximately 8pm. We enjoyed the coastal route after Genova and passing through a whole country (Monaco) in about 2 minutes. At Nice, we decided to push on 1 more hour to St Raphael where we had details for a campsite. However, having arrived around 10.30 we couldn't find a way to get to the camp site, with no local info, no taxis or buses apparently available. So we decided on a hotel. But..... we checked loads but they were all full, walking some distance with our packs. Oh dear. We decided that our best bet was to return to Nice, a much bigger town, with lots of hotels. But in Nice we walked for ages, asking at a dozen or more hotels and all were full. We discovered the weekend was the big holiday weekend in France. Oh merd. It was now gone midnight and we were all very tired. So, we decided to return to the station and catch *any* train. However.... the next train was at 5am and we then stood and watched as the station was closed by security guards with dogs. There were "weirdos" everywhere. What fun.

So, faced with a dismal night, possibly sleeping on the street in our sleeping bags (it being an inter-rail holiday, this was not unheard of!), we spoke to taxi drivers about camping to see if we could throw money at the problem and get them to take us *anywhere*. Banstead is a nice place to camp this time of year...... One driver asked some passing french lady to translate for him (maybe he knew her, we're not sure). But when she understood our plight (and saw our tired kids) she offered to let us sleep at her apartment for only 20 euros. This we gratefully accepted! The apartment was just right and we gave Julie 50 euros in gratitude. She told us to make ourselves at home, help ourselves to anything from the kitchen... and then headed out for the night with her boyfriend! We never saw her again, leaving the apartment about 7:30 in the morning whilst she was still asleep. She saved us a whole lot of trouble and gave the kids an adventure to talk about when we got back!

Most of the photos from this day were taken from the Venice campsite before we left......

Views of Venice from our campsite, early in the morning

A big ship!

Catching the train to Milano