Saint Raphael

One stop on the Mediterranean wasn’t enough for Sam and me, so we decided to try out the French Riviera after Italy’s Cinque Terre.
It wasn’t a spontaneous decision, obviously, since I’d already booked every place we were staying in Europe before boarding the plane in Kansas City.
But it turned out to be the right decision, even though it took more than seven hours to get from Italy to France.
We had to change trains four times, but we had the Mediterranean coast out of hour window most the time, so who could complain?
The beautiful beaches of Saint Raphael and its adjacent sister city Frejus were absolutely gorgeous.
We chose Saint Raphael based on the recommendation from travel guru Rick Steves’ staff, who also sold us our rail pass at a discount.
They said Saint Raphael, which is about 38 miles down the coast from Nice, is similar to Cinque Terre in that it isn’t a place frequented by tourists.
Well, foreign tourists that is.
In the two and a half days we were in Saint Raphael, we only saw, well, heard one other American couple.
Apparently Saint Raphael is where the French come for a beach vacation.
It’s easy to understand why.
The water was quite a bit warmer than Cinque Terre, and the weather was much hotter.
In other words, perfect beach weather.
Because it was late in the day when we arrived, we simply walked to the beach to take in the beautiful setting and put our feet in the warm water.
That night, we had a traditional French galettes for dinner. Galettes are like heartier crepes that are served open-face style with various fillings. Sam had chicken, crème fraiche, mushrooms and melted cheese, and I had ham, crème fraiche, mushrooms and melted cheese.

After getting some bamboo mats from a nearby supermarket, Sam and I headed to the beach and simply relaxed, alternating between sunbathing and swimming for the first full day we were there.
We tried an Indian restaurant that night and weren’t disappointed.
After dinner, we walked down the beach promenade and found a free concert happening on the pier.
Our final day in Saint Raphael was a mirror image of the first — waking up late, putting on some sunscreen and heading down to the beach.
It was heaven.
That night we dined at a restaurant right next to the Indian place, which were both just down the street from our hotel.
The only drawback about Saint Raphael was our hotel room.
We didn’t spend too much time there, but it reeked of cigarette smoke and the bathroom was so small you could barely get to the toilet.
Once you squeezed by the sink, you’d have to sit sideways on the seat because it was so close to the wall.
On the other hand, it wasn’t expensive and the owner looked like Brendan Gleeson, the British actor. He sat behind the desk sweating with his shirt half-buttoned when he checked us in.
It wasn’t a great room, but it still wasn’t as bad as the hotel room we booked in London.
For our next stop we were leaving the beach and heading to the mountains of Switzerland.