We arrived in Nice the day before the Tour de France final race and there were a lot of preparations happening. They were setting up a tent village of vendors and putting out hundreds of barricades. Our boat, that we would be touring Corsica on, was docked right in the middle of the activity so it was pretty exciting.
From our boat we took a bike ride to Monte Carlo, Monaco. We were with the group from the boat, probably about 100 plus of us. We try to stay away from the group as much as possible because it’s a great way to have an accident being bunched up with a group of other cyclists that included inexperienced riders, e-bikes and tandems. We were really glad we rode separate that day because a group of riders made a wrong turn and ended up in a long car tunnel that they were supposed to take a by-pass road for. Mike does a really good job using the map app to navigate for us. We heard about how scary the tunnel was from many people over the next week.
In Monte Carlo we went to the main center where the rich and famous people hang out in their fancy cars. I guess it’s just a thing to come there and be seen coming and going. It’s all lost on me but the area was packed with people taking videos of the Rolls Royces, Bentleys and Porsches.
The night before the race they had a fireworks and drone show. It was the first drone show we have seen and it was spectacular.
The morning of the race we tried to take a bike ride around Nice but after mostly walking our bikes for about a mile we found out that the roads and walkways were blocked by the Tour de France route. So we stopped for coffee, saw the inside of a couple of churches and then mostly walked our bikes back to the boat.
A few hours before the riders came through they have a commercial caravan of the many sponsors of the race.
The route to the finish line went right past our boat so we had the option of watching from the boat’s pool deck or walking over to the barricade to see the riders up close. It was amazing to see how fast the riders came and went.
The day after the race our boat left for Corsica where we spent the next eight days cycling on the island. I thought it would be hot and barren. Hot it was, but there were beautiful forests, small towns and gorgeous views. Oh and it was very, very hilly! Our bikes felt amazingly light with no luggage so we had fun riding fast and free.
When we got back to Nice we needed to get over the Maritime Alps to northern Italy. We couldn’t ride our bikes as the 98 miles had 9,750 feet of climbing and was too much for us to handle. I looked at the options like a train (too many train changes), a bus (no bikes allowed) and a rental car ($1,000 per day) but they just didn’t work. One of our friends on the cruise suggested Uber and what do you know, I was able to get an Uber van for a few hundred dollars. So when we got off the boat we were picked up by the van, driven over the mountains and were dropped off in Cuneo, Italy for the next leg of our trip.
Travel the World Backpacking 
Fantastic adventure! Thanks for sharing.
Just thought about you guys. How are things going?