A Day In Cannes, France with the Kids: The Ultimate French Riviera Escape

Today, we visited Cannes, France, which was actually during the time of the Cannes Film Festival. I absolutely loved Cannes. It reminded me a lot of Monaco with its expensive yachts on the pier, but what truly captivated me was the beach on Boulevard du Midi along the coastline. The water was a stunning mix of sky and indigo blue, and the weather was hot but bearable, thanks to the cool sea breeze. It felt like being in the Caribbean.

We drove into Cannes and decided to not take the toll route into the city because it was costly.

Side note: France has a lot of tolls. When we left Barcelona and drove into France, making our way to St Tropez, it cost us €92 in tolls one way. Ya…. expensive!

The day before, when we went to Monaco and parked in Nice, we paid €9.40 in tolls for the round trip. So, when we planned our day trip to Cannes, we decided to take the non-toll route to save us some money because in our household, every pound counts. We also realised that the time difference between the toll and non-toll routes was just a 20-minute difference, so with that in mind, we chose the non-toll route and started on our way.

As much as I loved the scenic route Google Maps took us on, I was terrified driving up the hills through the forest mountains. We were just inches from cliffs that could have sent us plunging to our deaths with the slightest wrong turn of the steering wheel. We couldn't take our eyes off the road for even a millisecond, or we would have been heading a long way down with no way back up.

We parked our car along the Boulevard du Midi strip, which was free. The road along the coastline runs for miles and at the time we went (end of May), there were plenty of spots to park up. The strip is categorised in blocks that are numbered and every block has a cafe (which are also numbered) where you can buy food and drinks while you chill out on the beach. Supposedly, the strip runs for 7 km, and I can believe that. We parked in block 22 and walked all the way into central Cannes, which I recall seeing block 14 when we started making our way back to the car after spending the day in the city. Even from where we parked the strip kept going for miles and miles.

Once we walked along the coastline and then passed the array of yachts docked on the pier, we ended up in the central core of Cannes that had tones of eateries to indulge in.

We stopped for some gelatos, waffles and crepes at Sun Ice which was c'est magnifique. Now I thought the Italians were the Kings and Queens of gelato, but the French proved me wrong because their gelatos were off the chain. My husband and I shared a raspberry and strawberry cup and oh my goodness, I was in love with the raspberry flavour. I love me some gelatos, but the raspberry gelato at Sun Ice was on point. If I could I would have tried every single flavour because they had some flavours that I had never even heard of before like apple, melon, creme brulé and cotton candy (barbe à papa).

My banana Nutella crepe was delicious and the kids enjoyed their scopes of chocolate, azzuro, strawberry and vanilla gelatos. My daughter got a waffle drizzled in Nutella, which she only ate the Nutella, and my hubby also got a waffle with bananas, Nutella and a scoop of banana nutty ice cream. We all ate like we hadn't eaten for days. That's how good the food was at Sun Ice.

Sun Ice address:

7 Rue Félix Faure, 06400 Cannes, France

After filling our bellies up at Sun Ice, we walked a few feet to the area where the Cannes Festival was taking place. I think a movie was about to take place because there were a lot of people dressed to impress walking in the direction of the Cannes building. Not only that, there were VIP black cars bringing people, possibly celebrities, to the front entrance. When we came close to the front entrance we had to go through a metal detector which I decided not to go through once I realised it was to allow spectators to stand in front of the red carpet area as they were waiting for celebrities to come through. With kids all under the age of 8 I was not trying to get myself and them caught up in all of that, so, we walked back and continued exploring Cannes.

We walked a bit more, but more into the town where there were a lot of shops and eateries. That is something I noticed in Cannes. Tons of cafés, gelato stands and tobacco shops (aka convenience stores). Not only that, there were a lot of Italian restaurants which made me feel like I was in Italy at times.

The kids were starting to get tired, and I'm not going to lie, I was too. I think all the walking we have been doing for the last 3 days was catching up to us so I decided that we rest by taking a ride on the public transport bus. I was in love with these cute little mini buses that we saw in town. These buses are part of Cannes transport and are called, ‘Le Suquet shuttle bus’, which drive around the old town of Cannes.

While we were waiting for another bus to take us around I noticed one of the mini buses parked up across from us. I went over and asked the driver where he was going, but I wasn't too sure what he was trying to explain to me, via the map he was referring to. His English wasn't too good and my French was absolutely horrible, but what I gathered was that he was going out of service and I needed to catch the next bus.

As I tried studying the map a lady approached the bus stop waiting for the next bus to arrive. She could tell I looked perplexed and came over to me to explain where the next bus was headed to (mind you she knew no English as well). With my husband, who knows a bit of French, we figured out that she was telling us that the bus was going to the top of the hill to the church which we could see from where we were standing. This church was Notre Dame d'Esperance (Our Lady of Hope Church). Now, I really wanted to get on this bus and see what was at the top, so the family and I jumped on the cute mini bus and made our way up.

On the Le Suquet shuttle bus, we paid €0.90 for the four us and the kids under four went free.

I'm so happy I came up with the bright idea to explore old town Cannes because it was absolutely beautiful. The cobblestone roads, old style buildings and homes surrounded by mini cafes and restaurants where you could sit outside and enjoy a meal, felt like what you see in the movies. If I was looking for a place to relax and take my mind off of anything, this is the place I would come to. Everything felt authentic and carefree.

When the bus came to a final stop at the top next to the church, we stayed on for we purchased return tickets back down to central Cannes. We got off the stop where we started along the coastline at block 14. By now the sun was at its peak hitting 27 degrees celsius. We walked about 20 minutes to our car and by the time we got there we all were three shades darker.

We definitely enjoyed Cannes, and I think when I decided to return, I'd love to buy tickets to see a great movie at the film festival.