S A WEEK-LONG PRESS TRIP ALONG the French Riviera began in earnest in early June, lunch at the rooftop La
Terrase restaurant at the four-star Boscolo Plaza hotel in Nice gave me a taste of the pleasures that were to come. First, the food.With the region’s fresh fruits
and vegetables, seafood, and locally produced olives and wine, farm-to-table isn’t a trend here, it’s a way of life.At La Terrase, that trans- lated into perfectly ripened melon wrapped in prosciutto and salmon tartare.Almost all of our meals, even breakfast, took place on rooftops, terraces, or on the beach itself — the Cote d’Azur has 300 days of sunshine a year.And our view — looking out over the dusty oranges and yellows of the medieval walls of Old Nice, set against the cerulean waters of the Mediter- ranean — was a preview, not only of the area’s natural beauty, but of its architectural and cultural depth.
An Image Problem All of this has made the French Riviera a cel- ebrated tourist destination for over a century. Ten million visitors come to the French Riviera each year, and the region isn’t looking to be- come more famous, our hosts with the French Riviera Tourist Board and Atout France told us. But it does have an image problem — its rep- utation as a glittery playground can overshadow
24 pcma convene September 2011
its importance as a center for international busi- ness, said Veruschka Becquart, head of the con- vention board at Atout France, and obscure the fact that the costs of holding a meeting there can be comparable to many other destinations. Meanwhile, the region has never been better equipped for meetings: 400 million euros have gone into renovating facilities in Nice, Cannes, Mandelieu-La Napoule, and surrounding areas, and more investment is planned, including a new 35,000-seat, multipurpose stadium. In Nice, we visited the Acropolis Conven-
tion Centre, built in 1984, which is undergoing renovations that will update more than 80 percent of its space. The Acropolis has four auditoriums, seating from 250 to 2,500 people, and more than 280,000 square feet of meet- ing space. From the Acropolis, it was a quick trip on the city’s newly built tramway to Old Nice, where we stopped first at Parfumerie Molinard for a perfume-making workshop, then continued on to a wine shop, where we sampled glasses of rosé, a local specialty. Coffee the next morning was at the
iconic, art- and antique-filled Hotel Negresco, a national monument built in 1913, where everyone from F. Scott Fitzgerald to the Rolling Stones has stayed.With a dome designed by Gustave Eiffel — of Eiffel Tower fame — it’s the grande dame of the city’s hotels, which together offer 10,000 sleeping rooms.
COASTING: Above, yachts abound along the Mediterranean coastline, including in the marina in Nice. Below, the Lérins Is- lands are just off the coast of Cannes.