Author(s): Julian Hale

Travel

We all have our image of the French Riviera: the azure blue of the sea and the swimming pools; the dark green of the pines and the swaying palms; the yachts and the sports cars on the Corniche roads; the hovering croupiers raking in the chips in the Monte Carlo casino. And all these are true. But there is another Riviera. Above Monaco towers a ruined reminder of Roman power, the Emperor Augustus Trophy of the Alps. Monuments to Napoleon and Maginot Line forts testify to turbulent times, while statues and gravestones recall the years from the belle poque to the 1930s when the British, then the Russians and Americans swept in with their money, and their weak lungs, for relaxation and rest cures. Julian Hale reveals how a piece of rugged, inaccessible coastline was transformed into a byword for luxury and hedonismbut always with a special beauty of its own.