I don’t normally report on things that happen to me in what’s left of the day after I post my diary for the day but I’m going to make an exception on this occasion.

Rabbiting on about being miserable about being away has been my theme for the last few days and today I must report that this trip opened up an opportunity for me that I NEVER thought I would ever have. After I posted my pic, there was a ‘gala dinner’ for the participants of the conference and I found myself sat in the lounge with two friends sharing a glass or two of the red stuff when a group of other colleagues that I didn’t know as well wandered past and said they were going out to a bar.

For some bizarre reason, I decided to go with them and ended up in a Cuban bar dancing to Latin American music and loving every moment of the experience, which is one I would certainly never have had under any other circumstances. It was brilliant! I realised too that I benefited from the hour time difference because we were slung out of the club at midnight and I was back in my room by half past – which equated to half-eleven in the UK so I could phone DM – that’s pretty cool.

This morning, I was up before dawn and spent a very pleasant forty-five minutes wandering the streets of Nice, with my camera in my hand before the start of the conference at 9am. This shop was on the edge of the market square and I just loved the mosaic façade – in fact all the buildings here are beautiful but this just seemed so quirky that I was really thrilled by it. (Despite the dead bunny!!!)

I’ve spent the whole day since in a darkened room and have just five minutes now between the daytime event and the evening’s entertainment to scribble down my thoughts……which are that I should one of these days learn that these trips do enrich my experiences of the world – if only I could let go of my own fears and inhibitions about travelling.

Nice is still Nice!

a year ago I was in the thrall of spices,