Six-Day Itinerary for Nice, France

Chez Pipo has been frying socca in the same wood oven since 1923, not since 1946 as some guides claim, and the current owner Steeve Bernardo still charges around 3 euros a plate for it. That single-digit price point tells you something useful about Nice: for all its glamour-adjacent reputation, the actual city runs on cheap chickpea flatbread, market produce, and a tram system that will get you anywhere for under two euros.

Day 1: Arrival and the City Center

Where to Stay

The Hotel Mercure Nicea Centre Vieille Ville sits right against the edge of the Old Town and works well if you want to walk everywhere. If you’d rather self-cater, an apartment inside Vieux Nice puts you above the market noise but inside the best food radius in the city.

Getting In From the Airport

Tram Line 2 runs directly from both airport terminals to the city center, roughly a 30-minute ride, with trams every 8 minutes from just after 5am to just after midnight. A single ticket costs 1.70 euros, though the airport-side machines only sell a 10-euro return fare, so if you’re only going one way, ride to the first stop past the terminal and buy the cheaper single ticket there instead.

Activities and Places to Visit

Walk the Promenade des Anglais for the postcard view of the Baie des Anges, then cut inland into Vieux Nice, where ochre and burnt-orange facades crowd narrow lanes that stay shaded even at midday in summer. Cours Saleya runs its flower and food market Tuesday through Sunday; Monday it flips to an antiques market instead, which trips up a lot of first-time visitors who show up expecting produce stalls and find brass candlesticks.

Where to Eat

Chez Pipo remains the benchmark for socca, the chickpea pancake that is Nice’s signature street food, cooked in a ferociously hot wood oven until the edges crisp and the center stays custardy. Skip it only if you’ve already grabbed a portion from the Chez Theresa cart inside Cours Saleya itself, which gets fresh batches rushed over roughly every fifteen minutes.

Day 2: Museums and Castle Hill

Activities and Places to Visit

Colline du Château, the hill above the harbor, holds only ruins now; the actual castle was demolished in the eighteenth century, so go for the panoramic view over the Baie des Anges rather than expecting standing walls. The Musee National Marc Chagall houses the largest public collection of his biblical-themed work anywhere, with entry around 10 euros outside special exhibition periods and free admission on the first Sunday of each month. The Musee Matisse, built into a seventeenth-century villa, tracks the artist’s late-career shift into cut-paper work and costs roughly 8 to 12 euros. If you’re planning several municipal museums, the four-day pass covering ten Nice museums costs just 15 euros, though note it does not include the Chagall museum, which is a national institution run separately.

Where to Eat

Le Bateau Ivre, overlooking the port, is a solid choice for a seafood lunch between museum stops; go for the bouillabaisse if it’s on the day’s menu rather than the safer standard options.

Day 3: Day Trip to Cannes and Grasse

Activities and Places to Visit

Cannes is a twenty-five minute train ride from Nice and worth exactly one focused day, not more. Walk La Croisette and the Palais des Festivals steps that Film Festival photographs make famous, but don’t expect a particularly interesting city beyond that stretch of waterfront. Grasse, France’s perfume capital since the sixteenth century when tanners started scenting their gloves to mask the smell of leather, is the more rewarding stop. Fragonard and Galimard both run free factory tours that end, unsurprisingly, in a gift shop, but the process itself, distillation and enfleurage explained by someone who actually does this for a living, is genuinely interesting rather than a tourist trap dressed up as one.

Where to Eat

Aux Arts et Metiers in Grasse serves honest Provencal cooking, better value than most of what you’ll find in central Cannes on festival-adjacent pricing.

Day 4: Beach Day and Colline du Chateau

Activities and Places to Visit

Nice’s beaches are famously pebble, not sand, so pack water shoes or expect sore feet. Plage des Ponchettes, right below the Old Town, is one of the most convenient free public stretches. If you skipped Colline du Chateau on day two, climb it now in late afternoon when the light over the bay is better for photos and the heat has broken.

Where to Eat

La Malmaison, with its terrace over the water, is worth the slightly inflated prices for one seafood dinner with a view, but I wouldn’t make it a repeat stop.

Day 5: The Surrounding Countryside

Activities and Places to Visit

Head toward Saint-Paul-de-Vence, a fortified hilltop village that has drawn painters since Matisse and Chagall spent time there in the twentieth century; the ramparts and gallery-lined lanes are worth a slow half day rather than a rushed hour. Skip the outdated “Esterel lemon groves” framing some older guides use; the Esterel is volcanic red-rock coastline south toward Saint-Raphael, while the region’s actual lemon capital is Menton, east of Nice, not west near the Esterel at all. If citrus is the draw, Menton’s February lemon festival is the moment to time a trip around, though outside that window the town’s lemon gardens are still a pleasant lower-key stop.

Where to Eat

La Colombe d’Or in Saint-Paul-de-Vence has hosted enough twentieth-century artists, some of whom reportedly paid their tabs in paintings still hanging on its walls, that it’s worth one splurge lunch even if the prices reflect the legend as much as the food.

Day 6: Last Morning in Nice

Activities and Places to Visit

Spend the morning back in Vieux Nice for anything missed, then finish with a final walk along the Promenade before heading to the airport via the same Line 2 tram you arrived on. Pick up olive oil, candied fruit, or a tin of socca flour from a Cours Saleya stall as a better souvenir than anything in the boutique shops.

Things to Know

French is the official language, though English is common in tourist-facing businesses. The currency is the euro. Spring and early autumn bring milder heat and thinner crowds than the peak of July and August, when the coast gets genuinely uncomfortable and hotel prices spike hard.

Tips

Nice’s public transport, buses and the tram network together, covers the city thoroughly and cheaply; buy a rechargeable transit card if you’re staying more than a couple of days rather than single tickets each ride. Topless sunbathing is legal and common on many of the public beaches, so don’t be surprised by it, and always check posted signage for any beach-specific rules. Restaurant bills include service by law, so tipping is a rounding-up gesture rather than an expectation, and leaving nothing at all won’t draw a second glance.