By Mark Palmer
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How reassuring to trundle along the Promenade des Anglais in Nice. And good of the prickly French not to re-name it.
But, then, the British have done their bit to add sparkle to this most famous of rivieras â€" this gilded corniche where, even if you don’t have a bean, it’s best to pretend you’re properly loaded.
Our plan is to rent a classic car with a soft top, rummage in the attic for heavy leather suitcases and arrive everywhere in David Niven-meets-Marilyn Monroe mode.
Glittering prize: The Hotel du Cap-Eden-Roc has had a recent £36 million makeover and sparkles
We find the cases, but settle for a humble Renault Laguna at Nice airport, which doesn’t quite knock for six the men on the door of the Hotel du Cap-Eden-Roc, in Cap D’Antibes, one of the grandest of Grande Dame hotels on the Cotes d’Azur.
I’d been thinking about the line from the author Gerard Noel, who said of this part of the world: ‘The biggest stars, the greatest loves, the richest plutocrats â€" all treated with equal condescension.’
He might have been right then, but you could never say such a thing about this iconic hotel, which recently had £36 million lavished on it and has been doing roaring business all this week during th e Cannes Film Festival.
Star guest: The hotel has been a favourite of celebrities throughout the decades, more recently Audrey Tautou
We are celebrating my wife’s birthday and our wedding anniversary. But there’s also some nostalgia going on.
My parents came here on honeymoon in 1951 and in those days anyone doing such a thing was issued with an Eden Roc passport in a smart leather wallet, which in turn came in a little Hermes box.
I found the passport in my mother’s desk after she died. The chateau was built in 1870 by the founder of Le Figaro newspaper.
With its duck-egg blue/grey shutters and milky stone, it’s such a beautiful building that even without the Mediterranean shimmering at the edges of the lush, 22-acre gardens, arriving would be as stupe ndous as it gets.
Beautiful men and women glide past the Corinthian columns of the marble hall in pristine white linen â€" and they’re just the staff. T. S Eliot loved this place, as did the Duke and Duchess of Windsor and Rex Harrison.
Today, Brad, Angelina, Madonna, Mick and Johnny are regulars, along with Audrey Tautou, star of Amelie.
This isn’t so much glamour on tap as glamour poured from a priceless decanter with silver stopper. On the way into the main restaurant on the sea front, there’s a black-and-white photograph of Marlene Dietrich sitting serenely in a deckchair reading a newspaper.
She was snapped in one of the cabanas hidden among trees and shrubs along the rocks near the water.
These wooden beach huts remain today exactly as they were 50 years ago.
We have lunch in one and conclude that honeymoons in the Maldives or Bali must be lovely, but that they couldn’t possibly beat a few days here.
In the evenings there are Bellinis on the terrace, then guests wander down to one of the restaurants built over the rocks. We could not think of a better setting for alfresco dining anywhere in the world.
Antibes is bigger than I’d expected. Sitting high up near the cathedral is the Grimaldi Castle, where Pablo Picasso holds court in a museum dedicated to his work.
Beautiful people's playground: Antibes has long attracted the rich and famous to its sparkling shores
On the walls you see some of the paintings he did while living in Antibes in the Forties, and through the windows the Cote D’Azur spreads out in every direction.
Keep going east past Nice and you can do Monaco easily as a day trip. We get as far as lunch in Saint-Jean-Cap-Ferrat and a stop in pretty Villefranche-sur-Mer for shopping, where most Sundays there’s a French equivalent of a car boot sale, but without the cars.
We snap up a couple of silver salts for what my wife assures me is a bargain birthday present.
Back in Hotel du Cap-Eden-Roc, there are no bargains. Never have been, never will be. A deep-tissue massage will set you back the best part of £150; an hour with the resident tennis pro £120. And a gin and tonic costs £23.
But I can promise you this: the massage will work wonders, the clay tennis courts are Roland Garros-standard and the gin and tonic will be the best you have ever tasted. Promise.
Travel Facts
Rates at the Hotel du Cap-Eden-Roc, in Cap d’Antibes, start from £396 per night, (www.hotel-du-cap-eden-roc.com). BA flies from London to Nice from £83 return (www.ba.com).
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