Photo: Spike (CC BY-SA 4.0)
Nice was Italian until 1860 — the House of Savoy's Mediterranean port, with baroque churches and palace facades painted Genoese ochre. The 1860 cession to France started a second life: the Russian aristocracy wintered here, the British built the Promenade des Anglais, the French bourgeoisie followed. Walk Vieux Nice with 29 narrations covering both lives — Italian first, French second, riviera throughout.
29 narrations, yours to keep — no subscription, no expiry. Works offline once downloaded, and if it isn’t for you we’ll refund it.
Going somewhere with no signal? Download on wi-fi before you set off — keep the screen open while it saves — then add it to your home screen so you can find it again. It works in airplane mode, with no roaming charges. Show me how to save it →
Every claim in this tour traces back to a named source — excavation records, the heritage authority for the site, and the primary texts themselves. Nothing is copied from other guidebooks, and anything we can't source doesn't make the recording.
Each stop is built from OpenStreetMap · 28 features in this old town (the field-surveyed mapping database behind Apple Maps), Wikidata · 25 cross-referenced entries (peer-reviewed structured records), the heritage authority below, and the primary historical texts where they exist.
Cross-referenced against Modern excavation publications · academic peer-review.
Every sentence is checked against those sources before it is recorded. If a claim can't be traced, it doesn't make the audio.
Every tour is reviewed by a person before it goes on sale. Stop selection, the route and anything ambiguous come back to the editor for a decision, and those questions routinely send a stop back for another accuracy pass. Nothing publishes on a machine’s say-so.
Spot anything inaccurate? Email [email protected] — fixed in the next pass.
The flower-and-produce market that has run daily since 1861. The painted ochre facades, the Matisse apartment at #1 Place Charles-Félix, and the Misericordia chapel — Nice's most ornate baroque interior.
The Cathedral of Sainte-Réparate, the Église du Gésu, Place Rossetti for socca, and the narrow lanes built on the Roman grid. The shuttered windows are Genoese, the laundry hanging across the streets is still Niçoise.
The hilltop where the citadel stood until Louis XIV demolished it in 1706. The waterfall installed for the Belle Époque, the old harbour where the daily ferry leaves for Corsica, and the views over the entire Baie des Anges.
The flower-and-produce market that turned a Savoyard-era promenade into Nice's social heart. Matisse lived above at #1 Place Charles-Félix from 1921 to 1938. The Chapelle de la Miséricorde at the eastern end is the city's finest baroque interior.
Dedicated to the 15-year-old Carthaginian martyr whose body was said to wash ashore in Nice in 250 AD. The dome is glazed Niçoise tiles in green and yellow. The 1757 bell tower added later — its proportions intentionally squat to survive earthquakes.
The 92-metre hill that held the citadel of Nice from 1090 until Louis XIV demolished it in 1706 — he didn't want any rival fortified city on his eastern flank. The cliffs facing the old port still show the 11th-century retaining walls.
The square at the heart of Vieux Nice, named for the Genoese architect who designed the city's first public ice-cream parlour. Fenocchio (1966) still serves 96 flavours including tomato-basil and beer. The Cathedral of Sainte-Réparate faces the square.
Built by the British colony as a winter walking promenade — Reverend Lewis Way funded the original 1820s path through his church and Anglo-Niçoise donations. The 7 km curve along the Baie des Anges is the city's permanent monument to the Belle-Époque invention of mass tourism.
Tap "Start Walking Tour" and allow location access. The map shows all 29 narration points.
Follow the suggested route or explore freely. GPS tracks your position. Reach a site and the narration plays automatically.
Each narration connects what you can see to the city's double life — Italian baroque substrate, French overlay. The Genoese ochre on the facades, the Provençal market on top, the British promenade alongside.
Narrations play when you reach each site. No buttons, no track numbers. Walk naturally — the stories find you.
Premium narration that sounds like a documentary. Warm and knowledgeable, not a textbook reading.
Every narration is drafted, cross-checked against primary sources, then passed through a second editorial pass that strips unsupported claims. Dates, names, and citations verified.
See all narration points on the map. Tap any point to hear it early or replay it later.
Cruise-day or longer-stay friendly. Two hours, with the modest climb up Castle Hill optional. The market, the churches, the harbour — all in concise narrations that connect what you see to the two cities Nice has been.
Spend an hour or a full day. Skip sites, revisit favourites, take breaks. The tour adapts to you.
Three ways, all built in:
The map-tap option means you can stand anywhere — even at home before you travel — and play any narration. GPS just makes it hands-free while you’re actually walking the site.
No. Use the “Download for offline” button before you go, and the entire tour — audio, maps, narration text — works without any data connection. Tap-to-play and the map both work fully offline. GPS itself doesn’t need data; only the download does.
Add the icon first, then download from the icon. On iPhone a guide downloaded in Safari cannot be seen by the home screen icon, so downloading first means downloading the whole thing twice.
Putting it on your home screen — iPhone or iPad (Safari):
On Android (Chrome): tap the three-dot menu at the top right, tap Add to Home screen (some phones say Install app), then confirm. On Android either order works.
If you opened this link from inside Instagram, Facebook or Gmail, you are in that app’s built-in browser. It cannot add anything to your home screen, and a guide downloaded there is thrown away when the app closes. Open the link in Safari or Chrome first.
Two backstops. First, the map shows every site — just tap the marker for the place in front of you. Second, you can manually queue any narration even when GPS is off. The platform never assumes GPS works; it’s the convenience layer, not the gate.
The audio runs ~2 hours audio total, but you walk at your own pace. 29 narration points across the site. Most visitors take 2–4 hours; some spread it over multiple visits. Once you buy it, it’s yours — there’s no expiry and no subscription. Come back next year if you like; the link in your receipt always works.
One purchase covers one device session. Most couples share earbuds and use a single phone — the audio is paced for that. If you want everyone listening on their own device, each person needs their own purchase. We do not gate sharing aggressively; we trust visitors to do the right thing.
Full refund if you never trigger a single narration on-site. Partial refund based on how far you got. See the refund policy for specifics.
GPS-triggered audio tours for heritage sites worldwide.