French Riviera kidnap update, all rise in TGV and Carnival Nice to China

The kidnapping of the Cote d’Azur businesswoman Jacqueline Veyrac kept all minds occupied on the French Riviera. This week, another three people got arrested and it becomes clear that indeed the former manager of La Reserve restaurant in Nice was ‘el capo master mindo’ behind the abduction. Cause of all trouble was a dispute over payment many years ago that was never fulfilled. The Italian manager even hired a former British SAS agent to prepare the kidnapping to perfection. Fortunately for the kidnapped lady the men did not consider the state of alertness in which we all are. If we see a strange car parked in our street we now call the police straight away. And so the address of the 78-year-old businesswoman was discovered within 48 hours thanks to a car that did not belong there.

Through our vigilance, we also found out that the timetable of the SNCF is tackled. You may no longer enjoy singing ‘tralala’ in the TGV from Brussels all the way to Nice Train Station, in a luxury seat and drinking bubbles. You have to get out of your seat and get another train to Nice in Marseille. Bummer. As of December 11, this is the new way to go. You are still better off by airplane; the entire month of November, tickets are on sale for around thirty euros to fly in from London or Amsterdam. Fun to do if you found an apartment you might want to buy and you just want to take a look.

Who often come to take a look on the French Riviera, are the Chinese. They are the largest growing group of tourists in the past year. And they love the Riviera so much that the Chinese city of Xiamen bought the Carnival in Nice. Not that we have to throw with noodles instead of serpentine, but the whole circus in terms of parade cars goes – after the party in February – by train to China to be part of the Carnival in Xiamen, a city of 5 million people. A clever promotion for Nice!

The region is a true magnet for anyone who loves the French Riviera lifestyle. Enjoying the sea, the sun, restaurants and all kind of sports. Besides the Chinese, we get this month more than five hundred African refugees. That’s not going very wholeheartedly; they come from the jungle in Calais, are poorly educated, unemployed and their arrival is arranged by the Paris government. Nobody knows what the plans are; will they simply get a free house and social benefits and that’s it? Or are they part of a ‘return to your real home’ campaign the National Front is suggesting. It is going to be an interesting election.

We know fortunately the outcome of another election; who will be the new owner of the group Nice Airport, Cannes-Mandelieu airport and Saint Tropez La Mole? It is not Monaco, and not the Chinese although they wanted, but a French-Italian consortium bought 60% of the shares from the French state for 1.76 billion euros.

For that amount, they can start working on a better exploitation of the airports, because the tourists just keep on coming. For those peoople and for our readers, we have two interesting events on the agenda: