On Sunday morning we again had breakfast with our friends (this time in the kitchen, my favorite room in the mas) and then bade them a sad farewell. Afterwards we made our way over to St-Paul-de-Vence and dropped our luggage off at our hotel, then headed off to St-Jean-Cap-Ferrat.

As an experiment we took the autoroute to Nice, and before we knew it we were sailing well past that city and on the way to Monaco. We gambled on taking the last exit before Monte Carlo, drove down past La Turbie, then followed the lower corniche back to St-Jean-Cap-Ferrat. The day was beautiful and almost hot, definitely still summery in late September, and the views along the coast were magnificent..

We had hoped to have lunch at the St-Jean port, but so did many other people?and parking was impossible. Instead, we wove our way to the Villa Ephrussi de Rothschild and had a great piece of luck: the young man directing parking in the not-too-wide driveway motioned us to the top and guided us into a wide spot--evidently he thought we couldn't fit the Scenic into the spots lower down the hill. For once the car worked to our advantage.

The tea rooms at the Villa are exquisitely decorated and have a fine view, but unfortunately all the tables were booked for a tour group; so we had lunch in the large patio. Then we walked through the seven different kinds of gardens (the Spanish has been used in a number of movies), with walkways that offer a glorious view of the Villefranche-sur-Mer bay.

Afterward we strolled through the villa itself, admiring the period rooms and collections of porcelain and objets d'art. The previous time when my husband and I had been at the villa the heat and humidity were so oppressive that we managed only two rooms; this time was much better, and we particularly enjoyed seeing the Savonnerie and Aubusson carpets in the main rooms.

Then it was time to return home, and we picked our way through the traffic?was everyone on the Côte d'Azur out enjoying the sun??and made our way back from Villefranche to Nice and then along the main road to Cagnes-sur-Mer. That was when the trouble started: some large event had caused the closure of the main road that runs through Cagnes up toward St-Paul-de-Vence, and that plus roadwork made it impossible for us to turn right. We tried side street after side street with no luck and ultimately drove down to Villeneuve Loubet, reversed direction, and finally managed to get onto one of the roads heading up into the hills.

On our return to Le Hameau our rooms were ready, and we hauled our luggage up the one flight of stairs and entered our favorite room, number two--a good-sized room with two beds, a center table and four chairs, a handsome bureau, a fireplace, a high-backed chair by a side window, and a desk against the wall next to the door that opens to the loggia. From the window behind the desk is a view over the hills, and the loggia offers a view out to the Mediterranean. The large bathroom features teak and a good deal of storage space: shelves with latticed sliding doors on either side of the double sinks. The curtain rod in front of the window gave excellent hanging space for laundry al fresco.

Le Hameau looks very much like the hamlet of its name. About 20 rooms are set in various buildings, and the complex is entered via an arbored path through a small citrus grove. All the rooms are different?there are even two small bungalows above the orchard?and the pool is spectacular. The original owner of Le Hameau, now retired to a small house above the original pool, is English, thus the dartboard in the little service area near the pool. The new owners have maintained the charm of the auberge, and we enjoyed our stay very much. Our friend loved the inn too, and we all wished we could stay for several more days.

Late in the afternoon we went over to St-Paul, walked around a bit (the crowds were gone by then), and had a light dinner at La Cocarde, a pretty little blue and yellow tea room along the main path. We had delicious French onion soup, salads, and omelettes and returned to our quiet hotel, happily content.

hi, mon amie, the Hameau was filled when we tried to book so that is why we ended up with several expensive days at the Columbe D'Or (that I don't regret)
I await more of your enjoyable trip in my favorite part of France.

Same here, Underhill. It's nice to visit Provence with you.

I haven't spent much time on the Riveria and am enjoying your trip report.

The one time I went was over 30 years ago. I stayed with with a friend in Cannes. I never got to Nice, Monaco, etc.

It was in connection with a trip that involved festivities in Ceret in the Pyrenees, as that town was twinned with a town near where I live. We stayed with the locals in Ceret and had the best food I have ever experienced anywhere at a banquet they put on for us, but I never made it past Cannes.

So glad to hear you toured those gardens because I would like to see them. Do they only have tours at certain times of day, like 11 and 2? How long did the outdoor part take? Also, when I wrote Le Hameau during the summer they were planning to sell in November and wouldn't take a reservation for next spring. When you mention new owners, are they in place now? I will try e-mailing them again. It sounds like a lovely area, but I'm not telling my husband about the traffic.

The new owners have been there a couple of years, but I noticed this time that the husband was not in evidence--so perhaps change is in the wind. That's too bad.

The gardens at the Villa Ephrussi de Rothschild are open all day--no tours, you just walk through on your own at your own speed. I don't imagine seeing everything outside would take much over an hour unless you linger for the views.

PROVENCE: Day Five

We had an excellent breakfast in the auberge's garden: yogurt, croissants, rolls, cheeses, homemade jams and marmalade from the fruit of the citrus trees, and Nutella. Then we packed up the luggage and took it down to the salon to rest while we left for our much anticipated lunch at Jean-Pierre Silva's new restaurant, La Table de Mon Moulin, near Le Rouret.

The drive took us across verdant hills and the pine forest of Roquefort-les-Pins, and we thought finding the restaurant in the small town of Le Rouret wouldn't be difficult. Wrong again! We drove round and round (but no bridges this time) and finally continued on to Grasse so as to return from the opposite direction and try again. This time we took the Route de Nice through Le Rouret and finally some distance out of town found a side road set off at a very sharp angle, almost a switchback, from the main road, the only sign for the restaurant facing the opposite direction.

We drove down the unpaved, tree-shaded road into a small parking area and saw the mill of the restaurant's name, set back in a garden behind stone posts with a wrought-iron gate firmly in place. We wondered what to do next, as about ten minutes were left before the specified time of 12:30 (lunch is strictly 12:30 to 2:00). Eventually I noticed a post with a canning jar on it and discovered inside a handwritten menu announcing the day's menu?I could barely make out the words in the flowing, violet-colored handwriting, but what I could read looked promising.

Finally we noticed a speaker box on one of the gateposts and asked hopefully whether we could come in. About five minutes later Isabelle Silva appeared to open the gate for us and lead us into the mill, now converted into a series of rooms, with the kitchen on the far side. The old mill crusher holds pride of place, and the rooms were warm with old wood and bright Provençal fabrics.

Lunch on that balmy day was served in the garden patio, and we were shown to our table beside the mill stream. A friendly dog came to greet us, and Isabelle reappeared with a plate holding five or six kinds of olives. Little by little the other luncheon guests arrived and were seated, and then Jean-Pierre himself came out to each table to announce the first course: a millefeuille with a piperade filling, a lovely purée of lentils on toast, and scrumptious small tomatoes, the best I had ever tasted.

Then came a salad of delicious Spanish air-dried ham, rabbit ravioli, and slices of green pepper stuffed with ricotta, the whole resting on sautéed zucchini. While we savored the salad, our table was honored with a visit from the house cat, who quickly learned that we were happy to have his company and sat expectantly awaiting treats. He would not be disappointed.

The next course, again announced by the chef, was sublime. I can still vividly remember the flavors that sang on the tongue: sautéed salt cod from Bilbao on a pool of succulent ham jus and tiny white beans, accompanied by a round of creamy polenta. The cat heartily approved of the fish, and so did we.

Then came the main course: a daube (Provençal stew) of Sisteron lamb that melted in our mouths, with delectable tiny carrots cooked in the sauce. Afterwords the cheese platter arrived and was left on our table for us to take as much as we wanted. Finally the dessert appeared: a puffy pastry surrounded by crème Chantilly and topped with apricot sorbet.

The bill was 47€ per person, and our two half-bottles of Burgundy (Gevrey-Chambertin and Santenay) added another 60€ or so. Silva has always been noted for a cellar of fine Burgundies, and those were the wine splurges of our trip.

Back in the car we drove like fiends across the hills to Le Hameau to collect our luggage and then head for Nice and the Musée Marc Chagal before it closed. We again took the autoroute and this time left it one exit too soon. However, with my trusty map of Nice in hand we were able to navigate to the Cimiez district in good order. We followed the signs for the museum, found a parking place on a nearby street, and then our friend (a major Chagall fan) and I set off to find the entrance. We walked and walked, following two more signs, and then discovered that we had simply gone in a circle and returned to the car, where a sign facing the other direction indicated that the museum was just around the corner.

After visiting the museum we needed to find our hotel, near Vieux Nice. That proved, for once, fairly simple, and we pulled up outside the hotel. The Beau Rivage was a few blocks down from the Cours Saléya and a block over from the Promenade des Anglais. The hotel was entirely renovated last spring and we had been able to snag a good rate: 190 Euros per night for a deluxe double. But our hearts fell when we walked along the dark, hot corridor to our rooms.

The décor was minimilist and drab: grey halls, grey walls in the rooms (with contrasting orange or blue in small amounts), and gloomy in feel, not at all Provençal; we felt as though we had wandered into Germany by mistake. The bathrooms were small, the advertised electric window shades were not in evidence, and the Internet connections were unreliable. All along one wall was a long counter (no drawers); when one of us was sitting at this "desk" the other could not get past. However, the air-conditioning was good, the plasma-screen television was impressive, the bed lighting was excellent, and the mattresses were very comfortable. We did wonder, though, why someone thought we needed heavy duvets in September?our friend survived the nights only by turning the temperature down as low as possible.

Bob attempted to access the Inernet via the hotel's connection, but it did not work. So he spent over an hour with the London support service, which concluded that something was wrong with one of the cables and promised that someone would be out to fix it?but no indication of when that might be. Since we had chosen the hotel partly because of the advertised high-tech Internet access it was a disappointment. The only alternative was to subscribe to the Orange WiFi service, which we did, and Bob was finally able to check the pile of e-mail from his business.

Later we left the hotel to wander through the narrow streets of Vieux Nice, stopping first to admire the flowers and produce at the Cours Saléya and to sniff the many trays of spices and glacéed fruits prettily laid out for inspection. We navigated our way along a side street to our usual restaurant, L'Ecurie, and settled down for dinner: crisp green salads with huge garlicky croutons, moules frites for Bob (my friend and I helped with the frites!), and pasta au pistou?a perfect late-evening meal.

On our way back to our hotel I stopped to reserve a table for dinner the following night at La Petite Maison, not far from the Beau Rivage and recommended by a poster on the tripadvisor.com site. Madame-the-proprietor was the only rude person I encountered in France?she evidently did not want to be bothered with my request and grimaced when I spoke to her in French, rolling her eyes at a nearby waiter, finally deigning to write our name down.

We window-shopped our way back to the hotel, planning for the following day's real shopping and making plans for our last full day on the Côte d'Azur.

Your time at the moulin echoes to me of our time there this September. I have photos of the cat and the two dogs wearing scarves. Mr. Silva is a bird hunter with these dogs. Did you go into his pool room with all the photos and Object D'Art devoted to his hobby?
We enjoyed the time there as you did, and now you are warming me up thinking of it on this cold, grey, dreary day here in New England.

No, we didn't see Jean-Pierre's photos, thank goodness. Hunting is NOT my thing!

Thanks. I was glad to hear the garden was open all day -- especially as we'll probably be lucky to not get lost! Your restaurant meal made my mouth water. Wow, rabbit ravioli--that's one I'd never heard of. I'm eager to hear more. I will try e-mailing LeHameau. I would think that even new owners would want to have some guests lined up.

Please let me know what you find out--I'd hate to think that our favorite inn in Provence will change very much. The present owners are Italian, BTW.

When we stayed at Le Hameau in late September 1999 (loved it), it was in the process of being sold to an Italian couple.

- Larry

We'll just have to hope that the new owners treat Le Hameau with TLC.

I forgot to put in my report that we drove down to the Promendade des Anglais area via the Place Masséna, which is thoroughly torn up--excavations in progress, fountains turned off, a real mess and difficult to navigate. Too bad, as it's normally a beautiful spot. Perhaps the redoing of the Cours Mirabeau in Aix-en-Provence is catching?