Orange juice – Day 51

The Hotel room was the smallest – and one – of the most expensive of the trip but I figured that this was just a pit stop.

However it was a very hot night. The air conditioning wasn’t working so I opened the windows and the racket from the street was intolerable. I shut them again.

Then at 2am the club across the street really ramped up. The bass was moving the curtains. I put my ear plugs in but you could still feel the vibration. I took a look out the window. It was called KWARTZ Club. Another brilliant name that would guarantee a domain. 

A couple were canoodling in a doorway.  Then a fight broke out. All a bit handbags at dawn, the combatants clearly drunk  and swinging for victory. 

Out of the club came a man who looked like he was made out of boulders. One of the original Fantastic Four perhaps? The girlfriend of the kissing couple now behind her man…the two of them watching.

Boulder boy had what I thought was a fire extinguisher. But it was pepper spray. He doused the the local boxing club who ran off rubbing their eyes to a street corner.

I dozed…then les flic arrived mob-handed. Eight of them in two vans. Blue lights filling my room. I gave up on sleep. By this time it was four o’clock. 

I caught up on four episodes of the slow-burn Korean police drama I had been watching on Netflix.  

In the morning I was asked about my evening.  I told the concierge who deducted my parking and gave me a discount. He apologised about the air conditioning.  From what I gathered there was a city-wide ban on AC use after mid October.  

‘Not just this hotel sir…all hotels.’ 

Hmmm.

On the road..we travelled the length of the Nice bay boulevard. Several kilometres then turned right over a clover leaf to the A8…280km…just the one road all the way to Orange.

We passed all those famous names like Cagnes and Antibes and Cannes and then Marseille where we went north.

The hues of the countryside here, and the earth where the road cut through, was all yellows and ochres and oranges. These were the colours of the French Impressionists. Their landscapes that always look a little out there..

actually quite accurate. ‘I paint what I see.’ said Manet.

Orange. I’d last been here with Teddy after the successful location of his egg-packer girlfriend from Bradford.  Then it had been a dusty little place with not much going on. I’d thought it charming and was pleased to find it still so now.

We’d put his Cortina up on a kerb and stayed at Le Glacier Hotel overlooking the market square where we proceeded to spend the night drinking Kanterbrau.

It had been a cranky little hotel. And the spry lady owner took a liking to us and made a special effort. She’d given me a great room overlooking the square and I felt like a prince after some of the accommodation we’d experienced on that trip.

The hotel was still there but not as charming now that they’d thrown out the pale blue shutters and installed plate glass.

Also still there was the incredibly well preserved 1st century Roman theatre. When Teddy and I had visited it had been practically derelict. We’d sort of broken our way in through a closed up building and wandered around.  Downright dangerous in parts. I wondered if he still had any of his Super 8 film of of us clowning around inside?

Now it was used for opera festivals and had been fully restored. I could have paid to go in but didn’t. 

The Glacier was full so I went to ‘Le Grand’ a Best Western on a back street. 

They gave me an appalling room with a view of the air conditioning units covered in bird dirt. And the air conditioning didn’t work either!

When I enquired at reception they moved me to their best room. So kudos for that.

Later that evening I took a stroll through the honey coloured streets. Still glowing after the autumn sunshine. Lots of kids were in costume celebrating Halloween which was actually in two days time on Monday.

 As I passed the Glacier they were having a lively salsa evening. Everyone out and dancing on the street.