Rugby World Cup diary: Leaving behind Phoenix Parc and a faux pas in the Scotland camp

Saturday

It looks closer on the map. Villefranche-sur-mer. An amble from the digs around the headland, four hours, 27,000 steps. From the Nice direction you climb and then drop, looking down on rocks and coves and man-made jetties long out of use, the town dug into the hillside. A lazy assumption is each ville, cap and resort is from the same mould and sprinkled in Riviera glitz. Here it’s smaller and more visual drama. A group of three-wheeler cars with motorbike throttles for steering and “Rent Me” on the side go bumper to bumper in morning traffic. In the water, a motorised paddle board, its rider wearing a helmet, flashes across the cove and rises above the surface on stilts. At the top before descending towards the town, a traditional house set in an old garden has cracked wooden shutters painted olive and walls of canary yellow. For some reason we are caught in a wave of optimism.

Sunday

Croque Madame for breakfast. Dreadful French delivers the order. The real madam, her face is young but stressed. She breaks into an indulgent smile at the mangle. On her shoulder is a tattoo of a woman sitting on a crescent moon and on her arm, in ink, a baby peeping over a cloud. I read it as a past catastrophe. On the promenade athletes are pouring to and from a running weekend convention. Self-empowering slogans decorate tents. Meet Your Extraordinary. You don’t have to understand them. North Face are slinging woolly hats as weekend sun bathers fling themselves on pebbles yards away. Emptied, the runners with their survival blankets, head torches and whistles drift up the streets from the beach. They have participation medals around their necks and stuffed inside pockets. The blue and white ribbons trail out. We all like to think of ourselves as winners.

Monday

Arrive back at Scotland’s sleepy training ground beyond the city limits. Out of context, there’s a halting site beside the pitch. Fascinated by the Nice tram stop – Phoenix Parc – and leaning against the window using the white T-shirt as blotter for the dripping perspiration, we ding, ding to a stop at Terminal One. All wrong and a hammer blow for time economy. Last time with Scotland was a fiasco when we lurched in with a question on Ben Healy when it was the turn of the BBC. That was a studs-up tackle on convention. The despairing look. Not from Tom English, BBC Scotland’s Limerick legend, but the pleasant Scottish press officer. The low-key pitch is a distance from action on the promenade, their hotel even further from the city. The formerly France-based Finn Russell walks out of the makeshift media room. A Scottish journalist inquires about a “good” place to go in Paris. The outhalf narrows his eyes. It depends on what you are looking for, says Russell.

Tuesday

Crooked teeth, bulging eyes. The chihuahua is locked into a handbag on the floor of La Habane, a restaurant, wine bar and, right now, a music hall. Behind the electric organ, a middle-aged man belts out cover versions to a middle-aged audience. Aperol Spritzs. The Doors’ Love Her Madly features an extended organ solo. On the corner, closed now, there’s a shop selling flip-flops, snorkels, postcards and bottles of chilled local Rose. A couple of doors away there’s an ice-cream parlour and close to that the art deco facade of the former casino that closed in 1977 and is now the Palais de la Méditerranée hotel rises above everything. By the railings at the beach, double lines of blue chairs face towards the water and towards the promenade back to back in a long line. You find yourself in certain places and realise Nice is just a big ol’ seaside town.

The Counter Ruck: the rugby newsletter from The Irish Times

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The Counter Ruck: Does rugby need the 20-minute red card?

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Johnny Watterson: Is this Ireland team in danger of flattering to deceive?

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[ Finn Russell: ‘Scotland won’t try to take Johnny Sexton out of the match’ ]

Wednesday

Sun falls behind the air conditioning units on the roof of Iskender Kebab and Champagne Liquor Market Store. An insect drones across the white light of an empty Word document. The Asian Tiger mosquito, a striped, worrisome, invasive creature. Bloated with dengue and Zica, so big they say “you can feel them land”. A confession: insecticide in room 312 has made this a weeklong killing zone. At Nice Ville the 20kg bag has become like a wilful living creature. Wrestling it up into the top deck of the TGV, the conductor receives a warm embrace. Nice is sunny 24 degrees, Paris is a halfway house to Irish winter and Irish goals. The fourth of seven (?) matches. The last blast of Cannes and Antibes coastline before the train catapults north towards cloudy skies. Behind, people are seeking shade in their summer clothes.