NICE
FRENCH RIVIERA
City of Nice - Nice in France
NICE CÔTE D'AZUR  

Nice, the capital and emblem of the French Riviera, heart of the Jet Set and acclaimed playground for the enthusiasts of sea, sex and sun. The carnival city with its extravagant parties and wild night-life, throbbing to the Mediterranean heat. Nice with its palaces and casinos; the epitome of luxury.

But, behind this enticing picture postcard lies a city and a region which deserves much more than this rather frivolous and limiting façade. Our web-site is designed to open the doors of the past and lead you into the extraordinary wealth of a rich, colourful history and culture of the veritable Comté of Nice, and to let you discover a unique identity, perpetuated today through its people and traditions.
The long and complex past of Nice and its region is a far cry from today's image of opulence and leisure. Seldom has a people, its traditions and spirit, been so wrongly perceived as that of this region.Historically, the Comté of Nice is not a rich region. It is a mountainous territory, covering 3000 km2, with a narrow opening on to the Mediterranean Sea, running from Nice to Cap d'Ail, which enabled a modest trading activity between Marseille and Genoa, the Mediterranean and inland Piemont, essentially based on olive oil, wood and leather originating from the mountainous hinterland. The economic poverty that blighted the region throughout the ages was particularly acute at times of conflict and is reflected today in the "traditional local cuisine”, composed of simple produce, where improvisation of using the left-overs is now a recognized art.
The historic importance of the Comté of Nice and its region is due to its geographically strategic position, on the one side its opening on to the sea and the other, as defender of the southern Alpine passes. The year 1860 saw a dramatic change for the Comté of Nice with its integration as part of France. As such, the Niçois had to learn, sometimes with difficulty, to adapt to this new identity and move into a new chapter of history.
Over the last 140 years, the population of Nice has risen from 44,000 to 370,000. Tourism has flourished, modern horticulture invented and chateaux and villas have sprung up on the surrounding hillsides, fulfilling millionaires'and aristocrats'dreams. A multitude of streets and avenues were laid, including the famous Promenade des Anglais with the Negreco Hotel, and thanks to the labour of thousands of Italian immigrants, casinos, theatre-houses and outstandingly luxury hotels emerged to the delight of this new cosmopolitan world.
The tumult of the expanding city left little room for the simple and unassuming nature of the local Niçois identity, although through its language, its writers (Francis Gag 1900-1988), Associations, such as Academia Nissarda, founded in 1904, the nissarte culture survived. In the 1930's, the established winter resort was yet again transformed with the massive arrival of summer tourists. These new sun worshippers contributed to effacing yet further the original soul of an impoverished and rugged people, simple and caring, forged by a multitude of origins: Latin, Greek, baroque, the Mediterranean and the mountains. Indeed, with the idea of national identity which professes to explain the present time, without heeding to or understanding the past, little room is left for the fine intricacies of a complex political and cultural history. However, it is this history, whose spirit lies behind the indolent palm trees, in the silent streets of the Old Town, in the busy harbour and along the shady paths of the hills, which continues to nourish the hearts and souls of all those who wish to go beyond the superficial cliché of the Côte d'Azur, to discover and understand in depth the Comté of Nice.

Welcome to our website NiceRendezVous, welcome to Nice in FRANCE.