A blog post I wrote before the Haute Route.....
International travel can be very unpredictable and stressful so I've been mindful to give ourselves plenty of time whenever traveling to somewhere new. With a 7:25am flight in Vienna Austria on Friday 19th, we decided it would be best to spend the night at the airport hotel on Thursday 18th. The airport is only around 60 miles from where Karel lives in Znojmo (he lived just a few kilometers from the Austrian border) but it takes a little over 90 minutes to travel there. I wanted to get to the airport at least two hours before our boarding time of 6:45am so the hotel sounded like a much better option. Plus, we would be able to sleep in an AC room (for the first time in 15 days, since arriving to Europe) and we were craving a good night of sleep since we haven't slept restfully since arriving.
At 6pm we had dinner in the hotel buffet (which was way overpriced but we were so hungry). It's been really nice in Czech because the Czech crown (currency) is in our favor as the US dollar goes a long way. Especially in Karel's town of Znojmo, it's very affordable for us to eat/sleep/travel.
After we ate, we watched the Collins Cup documentary online and then went to sleep around 9:30pm. The night wasn't too restful as I was nervous about the airport experience the next day but it still felt good to sleep in AC. The alarm went off at 4:10am and we walked across the street to the terminal at 4:30am. Austrian Airlines is strict with luggage weight and the size/weight of carry-on's so we made sure to meet all regulations. We carried on as much as we could of our Haute Route gear in the case of lost luggage.
The check-in process was very smooth. There was no counter to report to but instead, we checked in ourselves, printed our boarding passes and our luggage tags, fixed our luggage tags on our suitcases and then dropped off our bags at the counter. I purchased a "fast track" security ticket with our parking pass for 10 euros each as I was worried about going through security and while it did expedite the process, we would have been fine without one. After going through security, we had around 1:45 until we boarded our flight.
Karel and I did some work on Training Peaks for our athletes from 5am until 6:30am and then around 6:45pm, we boarded a bus that took us to our plane. We then boarded our Austrian Airlines flight and around 7:30am we were off to Nice, France. I slept most of the flight and Karel read a Czech cycling magazine that he brought with him.
With this being our first time to France and first time to Nice, it was beautiful to see the sea and all the mountains. I couldn't help but think that we would be biking over many of those mountain passes.
We arrived shortly after 9am and I felt the stress lift off me after we received our luggage. I was a little nervous about taking the tram to the city to get to our hotel but I used the Rome2rio app to understand the tram and I also found another blog to understand how to buy tickets, etc. We bought our tram tickets for 1.50 euros each and when we were about to board, we weren't pushy enough and the doors closed on us so we had to wait another 10 minutes. The tram took about 30 minutes to get to our destination (which was Garibaldi square) and then we had a 0.4 mile walk (plus a little extra until we found the right way to go) to our hotel.
The Haute Route booked all of our accomodations as part of our package so we added on an extra night to our Nice hotel - Aparthotel Adagio Nice Centre. Although we arrived around 11am (well before our check in at 3pm), our room was ready and they let us check in early.
The room had AC (yippee) and a small kitchenette which was nice to have. After unloading our stuff, we were hungry for a meal so I found a brunch restaurant called Les Clay. We sat outside and I enjoyed pancakes and eggs and Karel had a bagel bread sandwich.
After we ate, I was so exhausted that I napped for about an hour. I wanted to sleep all day but Karel wanted to go to the sea and I couldn't resist the opportunity to swim in the Mediterranean for the first time.
We walked to the Port of Nice and checked out the beautiful yachts before heading to the rocky beach. The water was incredible blue and refreshing and super salty. It was amazing to just float on our backs in the water. We enjoyed swimming in the ocean and laying in the warm sun.
Around 3pm we left the beach and had lunch at a restaurant (not sure of the name) as Karel was really wanting some fish. There wasn't much on the menu for me so I enjoyed pizza and salad (I can always opt for Pizza ;) Karel learned how to "eat" his fish from the waiter and he really enjoyed his meal. Mine was also delicious and I finished it all but two pieces (Karel finished those slices for me).
We then walked around the city, I got us lost again as we tried to find the LIDL grocery store and we arrived back to our room around 7pm for a light snack (yogurt, fruit and muesli).
We slept amazingly well and woke up a little after 7am on Saturday morning. Only one more sleep until we start the toughest amateur cycling event, the Haute Route Alps!
