Balika, Sven, and the kids picked me up at the Nice airport and we stayed in Antibe for the night. Sven had little problem resesitating my ipad by restarting and eliminating cookies.
In the morning we walked through the market. The fresh figs were the size of tangerines. Balika was looking for a classic door knocker but the only ones at the market weighed as much as most American doors. We bought bread, cheese, and strawberries.
At the Picasso museum--a sixteenth century castle built at the site of the ancient Greek acropolis of Antipolis overlooking the harbor of Antibe, where picasso had lived and worked at the end of WWII, four-year-old Bella and Sven sat in the ceramic room and sketched impressions from Picasso's collection of hand- formed and painted plates. Seven-year-old Eilidh showed me her favorite paintings.
Three hours later we reached St Saturnin and settled into our rental for the week. Arched hallways and a confusing winding staircases separated kitchen, living room, four bathrooms and bedrooms. The kids and I went walking around the tiny town looking for a bottle of wine and some fruit and milk for breakfast.
Our house was next to the ruins of a 12th century castle. It could be considered to be on three levels however there are some bathroom and laundry alcoves partway up each of the tiled spiral stairwells that wind up either side of the 16 foot wide house. The first floor consists of cave-like arched kitchen, living room and dining room. Bella and Eilidh share a room next to mine on the second floor. A tv and computer room is a few steps above that and one set of stairs goes to Balika and Sven's suite and another winds up to Fabienne's room.There's not much of a view other than the neighbor's ivy-covered walls as the homes are kind of built amongst tunnels and rock paths through the town's protective walls.
In the evening we followed the passageway through the old city walls and climbed up the hill amidst the ruins of the Thirteenth century hilltop castle.
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