Nantes- Day 1

Hello Everyone,

Two weeks ago, I had a few days off and decided to go somewhere, but as it was last minute trip was looking for a closer destination and I have never been to France decided to go there.

Looking into different flights and timeframes Nantes and Bordeaux were the two options, I was wondering between and I choosed Nantes.

I arrived on Tuesday afternoon and had the next three days to explore the city of Nantes.

Day 1:

My plan for the day was to explore the central part of the city and one or two tourist attractions, but first croissant.
I looked at a few bakeries online and decided look for these as they were recommended as the best. I went to one of them but closed that day 😦 I was determined to find another bakery and there was one a few minutes away. It appears there is a backery in every corner.
I choose a buttery croissant and pain au chocolate, there wasn’t a place to eat inside as the bakery as it was very small, so started looking for a place under the sun as the weather was so nice.

After a couple of minutes, I found a few benches near the river.

Nice place.

From the previous day, I had the impression that people don’t run so much and was I wrong? In the morning around the river, I met mostly runners.
I will just give a bit of context about my comment above. As I live in Dublin and previously in Berlin had used people jogging late evenings and early morning, but was surprised when the previous day I didn’t see too many people, but it was just a day here so incorrect assumptions.
For me is interesting to see how people live in another city and this is why I usually wouldn’t go to the capital city or strait to the city’s tourist attractions.

I was walking around the river and as I didn’t have any plans or a strict schedule enjoyed the weather and the walk. It seemed that the river was going quite further so a quick check on Google Maps decided to take the next turn on the bridge and walk on the other side of the river towards the central part of the city.

It was a lovely walk where I could see different houses and building architecture:

It seems that quite a few people are living in boats, now I wonder if there is an opportunity to rent for an evening to experience the city differently like Airbnb.

I was taking photos with my camera but it felt weird like I was the only tourist and even someone asked me something in French like why you are taking photos. It felt as if it was strange for someone to take photos, or maybe this was my feeling.

I have always lived in tourist cities and I am used to see someone taking pictures and for me is some kind of normal.
Later I saw a few people speaking other than French who seemed as a tourist but nobody was taking photos.

After walking for a while I wanted to take a break and it appeared I was in front of one of the city attractions the Ile de Versailles garden – Japanese Botanical Gardens.A green tranquil space in the city center where people practice yoga and have a meal or just chill.

A few more photos from around the Erdre river:

There was this cool building, I did not found what is it but it was looking so artistic.

My walk continued to the city center or as they called it in French center Ville. It was probably two o’clock afternoon, and as I was in France, I wanted to try as many pastries as I possibly can 🙂 I walked into another bakery where the queue was long, but they were serving people very quickly and no photos from the first day.( I come back the second and the third city). I took something with apples it looked as delicious as anything in the bakery.

I started looking for a place where I could enjoy this delicious pastry, and come across a small green space which appears to be another of Nantes attractions.

After the small break, I start walking around the city center and saw a coffee that was a bit different than the rest. I went inside, it was an old house turned into a bookstore and a small coffee. Lovely place.

I wanted to take better photos inside but downstairs was full and I am not used to asking or just taking photos of people. I need to travel more hehe.

So after relaxing for a another bit, I decided to go to the city castle, a historic monument and museum. I wasn’t sure if I wanted to go inside as I was planning to explore a bit more the city, but at the end took a ticket and went around for an hour. It was interesting and had a lot of historical facts, definitely worth a visit.

From the Castle Terrassa, it could be seen some of the surrounding buildings as an old biscuit fabric.

I saw a weird building with a lot of greens and as I read that the botanical garden was close by assumed it was, but to my surprise, it was a parking lot 🙂

They had as well bicycle parking next to it which was a surprise to me. I am saying this as in Dublin, Ireland you need to be very careful where you park your bike, as you may not find it and if there is such a place not sure if bicycle will survive long 😦

Next to the car and bicycle parking’s was the railway station with this artistically cool looking coffee or restaurant on the top.

And across the station was the real Botanical garden which was not far away from my first spot assumption. I was very tired and decided to leave it for the next day so I headed back to the hotel which was not far away but still not in city center.

I was thinking what to have for dinner, but after the third croissant, I couldn’t eat anything more, I was feeling pretty full. On my way back to the Hotel, I went to the local supermarket, just to check what they have and how different is from Ireland or Bulgaria.
It was more or less the same as prices and products with much more cheese selections.

I thought, I made photos of outside and inside the supermarket but no. This is photo from another store around the city center, it was surprise to see the SPAR chain in France as I thought it was just Irish shop.

I wanted to buy some crackers and cheese. I found plenty of cheese but crackers… They had some type of croutons or not sure how to say it but it was the type of dry bread cut into small pieces or slices. It was funny because you could find so many isles of sweets, chocolates, etc. but the salty snacks are one very small part.