Today, Charles and I took to driving the French countryside. And by Charles and I, I mean that Charles drove and I sat in the passenger’s seat biting my nails and attempting interpret the instructions from Google Maps on my phone. More on that later.

We tried to get a reasonably early start this morning and managed to leave our apartment by 8. Our plan was foibled, however, when we got to our rental car and found that someone had busted the small back window to see if we’d left any goodies under the privacy panel in the back hatchback. Fortunately, we had not – so nothing was stolen. We were going to just keep driving it as is but report the incident to Hertz – but when we called and finally got a live person (it was not easy to navigate their all-French automated answering service), they made us come in to exchange it. Fortunately, we got it exchanged fairly easily – but set out a good hour after we planned to.

We started at St Paul de Vence, a very crowded old town up on a mountain. It was similar to the other “old towns” we’ve toured so far, except that it sat up on top of a mountain, so was more isolated and offered some great panoramas of the surrounding area. There was also a very beautiful and welcoming cathedral. It is becoming difficult to pick a favorite of the cathedrals we’ve peeked into.

After St Paul de Vence, we drove for about a half an hour through the southern French hill country on the Route Napoleon and stopped at a highway pull-off area to eat the picnic lunch Charles packed for us this morning. The view was spectacular and the cool breeze carried in the sounds of church bells from the villages below. We couldn’t have found a better spot for a picnic.

After our picnic, we drove for another half an hour or so along the Route Napoleon, the route that Napoleon marched in 1815, taking advantage of several of the highway pull-off areas to get a better look at the mountains and villages below and take pictures. The highway is very curvy, hilly, and narrow, so I alternated between feeling sleepy from the rocking of the car back and forth on the switchback curves to feeling terrified that we were about to collide head on with another vehicle and/or plummet to our deaths down the mountainside. If Charles had these same contradicting sensations, he didn’t let on – and for that I am grateful.

We had hoped to also see the Gorges du Verdon (France’s grand canyon), but the delay from the rental car didn’t leave us enough time. So we turned back around and headed back to Grasse. Grasse is know for its perfumeries, many of which offer museum and factory tours for free or low cost in order to market their perfumes. We had many great options to choose from, so went with Rick Steves’ recommendation to visit the Fragonard museum and factory tour. We were not disappointed. The museum and factory tour were both free and the factory tour was given in English and was very informative. To thank them for the tour and to say I bought real French perfume in France, I purchased a small bottle of perfume.

After the tour, we strolled around through Grasse’s old town, which was different from the others we’d visited so far because it was quieter with fewer shops and cafes, making it feel just a little older than the other old towns we visited. It too offered a pretty good view.

After we finished up in Grasse, we headed back to Nice, but chose to go the long way to Cannes so that we could drive home along the coast. Sounds relaxing and romantic, right? France’s road system is very confusing for foreigners and it was all I could do to attempt to interpret GPS navigation. Many of the “streets” are more like alleys and are hard to see until you’ve already past them. “Rerouting” happened a lot. And France LOVES roundabouts. Every kilometer, there was another roundabout. The GPS would tell us which exit to take in each roundabout, but in general, it was exhausting.

Back in Nice, we chose a different parking garage this time. We also made sure to leave the center console open and the privacy panel in the back off so that would-be thieves could see that there was nothing of value in the vehicle. Let’s hope this saves us the hassle of dealing with more rental car damage. We headed out for dinner and chose La Voglia, known for offering a good Italian taste of the Riviera. We both ordered pizza and were satisfied with our choices, though I’m not sure Charles was satisfied with my choice, since I ordered the Napolitaine, which is essentially a cheese pizza with anchovies (anchovies are a big deal here). And of course we wrapped up the day with our gelato. Tonight’s flavors: tiramisu and Irish coffee.