e d'Or or Corniche de l'Esterel is the new
road from Theoule to Saint-Raphael. The word is incorrectly used, for
the most part, concerning the two coast roads, the Petite Corniche and
the Corniche l'Esterel. For although these beautiful roads do at many
points stand high above the sea, they descend as often as possible to
connect with the coast towns. But the analogy with the architectural
term is perfect in so far as the Grande Corniche and the Moyenne
Corniche are concerned. At every point these wonderful roads,
undisturbed by tramways and unbroken by towns (except La Turbie on the
Grande Corniche and Eze on the Moyenne Corniche), you feel that you are
traveling along a horizontal molded projection above temples built with
hands and the activities of humankind.

From Nice to the Italian frontier the railway, darting in and out of
tunnels, keeps near sea level. A small branch climbs from Monte Carlo
to La Turbie. The tramway from Nice to Menton follows the Petite
Corniche, with a branch to Saint-Jean on Cap Ferrat.

For tourists, Nice is the center of the Riviera, the place to come back
to every night after day excursions. Everything is so near that this
is possible. Nice is the terminus of railways and tramways east and
west. It is the home of the ubiquitous Cook. You can buy all sorts of
excursion tickets, and by watching the bulletin posted in front of the
Cook office on the Promenade des Anglais, it is possible to "cover" the
Riviera in a fortnight. But this means a constant rush, perched on a
high seat, crowded in with twenty others, on a _char a banes_, and only
a kaleidoscopic vision of Mediterranean blue, hillside and valley green
and brown, roof-top red, wall gray and mountain white. At the end of
your orgy, instead of distinct pictures, you carry away an impression
of the Riviera in which the Place Massena is a concrete image and the
rest no more than dancing bits of colored glass. Saint-Raphael and
Menton are the luncheon breaks of two days, and the Grande Corniche is
a beautiful vague mountain road over which you whizzed.

And yet there are those who go to the Riviera every year for a daily
ride over the Grande Corniche, and who dream during ten months of two
months at Menton!

Sitting with our legs daggling over the stone coping at the entrance of
the port in Nice, the Artist and I figured out--on the basis of just
time for a glimpse and a few sketches--how long it would take us to
wander