Lifestyles of the Rich and Famous 

Cannes – Nice, France

I was never quite sure what the French Riviera was until the last few days. I think I know now. It seems to be the fanciest place in Europe – outside of maybe some ritzy aggrandizement in Paris. 

Cannes to Nice to Monaco seems to be the heart of it. 

Diana and I don’t have a ton of interest in the latest fashions – or at least I don’t. But it was pretty fun to find ourselves in the middle of all the action yesterday in Cannes. 

First off, the beach. Filled with people from all over the world. British, French, German, American, Brazilian, African, Moroccan. I guess many of them here for the film festival – which finished last night. 

I enjoyed the beach much more than I usually do. I realized that we can set up the rain fly as a sun shade – without even using the causal tent at all. Turns out that the beach is a pretty nice to write the blog when I’m not sitting around in the direct sunlight. 

And then, after the beach we’re making our way down the strip between the ocean and the big hotels. It felt kind of like Old Dan and Little Ann afforded us special credentials – because it was just us and the fancy limousines on the street that seemed to be closed to everyone else. 

Men in tuxedos. Women in big poofy dresses with feathers and sequins and stuff. I don’t think we actually saw any real stars – but we definitely saw some of the beautiful people. 

Of course, the truly beautiful are staying out on big yachts in the harbor. And somehow Diana managed to find us our own boat for the evening. 

Who knew that you could rent an ocean-going vessel on Airbnb? 

Pretty nice. A little galley kitchen – like my parents’ RoadTrek (“the RT”) – which allowed us to cook dinner on board the ship. Pasta – kind of a chicken scampi – complete with all the herbs that we found along the road – salad and wine – with live music wafting across the water from a nearby restaurant. 

And then, of course, French Toast for breakfast – what else would we have? Duh!

Just a short ride to Nice this morning . . . Might have been the most bikers that we have seen in one day on the whole trip. Seemed like tons of older men riding their $10,000 super-lightweight bikes. We probably saw some 400 bikers. 

But what is interesting is that not a single rider acknowledged us in any way. Not a Bon Jour. Not a hello. Not even an “on your left.” Nothing. 

Don’t know what that’s all about . .  .

But we did stop to take a picture of the snow-capped peaks that surround Nice. And when we did we met a French couple that actually deigned to talk to us. They’re flying to Canada in a few weeks to visit Nova Scotia and Prince Edward Island. They were biking – but not so serious as these other folks – who are apparently training for the Tour de France Seniors Division, and can’t be bothered with slow tourists like us . . .

Alright, Nice is nice. We took a city tour and learned about some guy named Albert Spaggiari. Ever hear of him? We hadn’t.

According to the tour guide Spaggiari was the mastermind of the biggest bank heist ever. The story goes that Spaggiari went to a party that was attended by the head of security at this big bank in Nice. This guy had too much wine – no surprise there – we’re in France after all – and he started bragging to Spaggiari about how the bank was so locked down that it had no security system. 

Spaggiari figured out that the bank could be accessed through the sewer system, and he recruited a bunch of people to help him pull off the heist. They tunneled from the sewer system into the bank, and then, on Bastille Day – when most everyone was on vacation – broke into the bank and stole like 47 million francs – the equivalent of like 30 million Euros. 

The theft was so relaxed that they hung out in the bank for a while, drank champagne and wine to celebrate – and painted a note on the wall that said something like: “Without weapons, neither hatred or violence.” I guess they were pretty proud of themselves for procuring the money without guns or anything.

The police eventually caught Spaggiari, and after some drama he was tried for the robbery. During the trial – which was, I guess, kind of a casual affair – Spaggiari drew some diagrams and was showing the judge some complicated mapping stuff that helped explain how they pulled the crime off. The judge became distracted looking at the maps, and Spaggiari jumped out of a third floor window onto the street below. Fortunately for Spaggiari, he landed on a car that happened to be there, which, I guess, helped break his fall. 

He managed to extract himself from the car, limped to the corner and jumped on a waiting motorcycle. He jetted to the airport – which Diana and I biked past today – and bought a ticket to Argentina. Once there, he gave interviews to the local news agencies about the bank robbery and bragged about his escape from the French police. 

Later, he became homesick and had plastic surgery so that he could return to Nice without being recognized. Unfortunately for him, he was a heavy smoker and ended up dying of lung cancer. Legend has it that his mother found his body on her front porch.

The 46 million Francs were never recovered. 

Ocean’s Eleven was apparently inspired by Spaggiari. 

Quite a story. 

Two more things . . .

The tour was led by a woman named Dineris. She lived in St. Petersburg, Russia, until she was twelve. Then she lived in Vancouver for a number of years. Then she moved to London, where she lived for four years, until COVID – when she realized she wanted to live in a sunnier climate. She’s been here ever since. Stories like hers make me realize what a home body I really am . . .

A bunch of interesting people on the tour … There were the five German women here on a girl’s weekend. There were the two young Americans from North Carolina, who now live in Manhattan and work as consultants. There was the Michigan couple – Eric and Diane – who are about our age, have two kids about the same age as our kids, and who are going to take a tour boat up the Rhône River from Arles – a town we were in a few days ago. 

With all this Cannes stuff going on, and Tom Cruise around, I guess we were inspired. Diana figured out that we could see the new Mission Impossible in English – with French subtitles. And then afterwards we’ll have dinner – late. 

Which brings me to another back story. 

Our friends Corey and Maree are amazing cooks. Going to dinner at their place is like visiting a gourmet restaurant. Multiple courses. Always super good. Always inspired by their travels to places like India, Thailand, South America, etc. 

The only problem? Corey and Maree eat on more of a European timeline. 

It took us a few times before we picked up on it. We would show up at their place at 7. This is already late for us, but we figured we would just eat right away. Nope. We would arrive at 7:05 – thinking we were fashionably late. But when we knocked on the door no one would answer. Eventually Corey would come riding up.

”Oh, sorry guys, just finishing my ride. Got kind of a late start . . .”

Round about 9 p.m. we would sit down for the wonderful meal. Never mind that we would almost die of starvation in the interim . . .

But eventually we learned. Always eat before you arrive. 

And one day something came up. I don’t remember what exactly. Maybe a badminton game went late. Something very important. Anyway, we decided that rather than call and let them know, we would just show up late – and by the time we showed up dinner would be ready. 

Corey’s last name is Brinkema, and we agreed that we would “out-Brinkemaed the Brinkemas!”

We were pretty happy as we headed over to their place at about 9 p.m. – a good two hours late. 

But when we arrived, thinking that we would be just in time for dinner, Corey was no place to be seen. 

“Oh, hey guys. Just finishing my sauna. It was amazing!” 

Turns out that their neighbors have a sauna and it was available that evening . . .

Dinner? I think we ate at 10:30 or so. The French would be so proud . . .

So our plan tonight is to go to the movie, and out-French the French.  

We’ll see how that goes.

After dinner we hop on our overnight ferry to Corsica. 

The land of Napoleon awaits . . . Pretty sure we’ll find the Spaggiari money there. Hopefully we can still use the francs . . .