It is exactly how I expected the night train to go.

I tossed and I turned most of the night. I woke up first time, 1:30am. Woke up second time, 3:45am. Third time, 4:15am, etc…

Never a heavy sleeper when it comes to transport, I got a fair amount of sleep but in doses. Luckily I don’t get tired during the day so it shouldn’t affect my day too much.

I did have an awkward moment of being unable to open a door. I tried pushing it, pulling it, finding a button to open it. Everything. Unfortunately no joy. Turns out I have to open the double doors by pulling them apart. I like to think I am bright but I am not a scientist.

Okay, so we were due to arrive at 8:30am but with a slight delay. Once I got out of bed, I cleaned my teeth and got dressed for the day ahead knowing we wouldn’t get a shower till later I used all the toiletries I had to freshen up. I gazed outside the window and the weather was beautiful.

It was nicer than what we had last week in Paris but the weather this time took us back to Marseille and Montpellier.

We arrived at the station but we had time to kill before we were to check into our hotel. So it was enough time to get some food and see a bit of Nice before then.

So what did we do? Well we had a small wander and decided to go and the match tickets for tomorrow, which took a while to find. The tickets were at an exposition area outside an Novotel. Once we got our tickets, through a good amount of UEFA security, Coatesy noticed that at the Novotel was an roof bar. This was too good to turn down.

The roof bar was lovely, beer was expensive but it’s what we expected. We had a few there whilst some Icelandic television was proceeding on the nearby table. This time my media expertise were not called into action. If only I spoke the lingo.

We continued our wander through nice where we found some nice market place. It wasn’t long until Coatesy while eating an ice cream said “Nice could be my favourite place in France”. To be honest he had a point, Nice was… Well… Nice. Pun not intended.

Okay, pun entirely intended.

We wanted to watch France play Republic of Ireland at a bar so we went on a search to find somewhere to base ourselves for a few hours. Not before we went to the beach before to take a few pictures of the view. Coatesy and Trigg saw a rooftop to go up and take a picture from up high. But I couldn’t be bother with my heavy bag so I had a few quiet moment by myself gazing out towards the Mediterranean with the sunshine beaming down on it. Bliss!

I was low on battery didn’t have enough to take lots of pictures but we got our standard flag picture.

We found a bad that was doing happy hour (happy days), and got the rounds in. It was great for a little while when Ireland went ahead against France which could lead to an upset. Unfortunately for the Irish the French overcame them in the end.

We finally got a taxi back to the hotel and checked in. The guy running the hotel was a decent chap. He was very helpful and he said we should head to the nearby beach for dinner.

I could get used to this. Part of me is delighted we finished second in the group.