Cannes: Day One

After a slight scare with my credit card (the card I used to reserve the rooms was canceled due to security reasons), I finally was able to check into the hotels that I'll be staying at for the duration of the festival. Because of high demand, I couldn't book 12 days in one location and had to split the reservations up.

To contain costs, I'm staying in Juan les Pin, a town located about six miles east of Cannes. To travel to Cannes, I have to walk five minutes to a train station and then take a five-minute train ride into the city. The cost of a one-way train ticket is 2 Euros, or about $2.60.

After arriving in Cannes for the first time, I immediately went to the accreditation office -- located on the ground floor of the Palais des Festivals convention center -- to pick up my press badge. This was an easy process because I obtained the credentials by mail in March. The front of the entrance was crowded with people, mostly in black-tie, who turned out for the premiere of "The Da Vinci Code."

There are two red-carpet premieres each day at Cannes. Most of the red carpet is lined with paparazzi. If you want to walk the red carpet, you need to secure an invitation, which usually happens by networking heavily with people involved in the film.

Meanwhile, inside the convention center, I went to the third floor, where I obtained a free login and password for wireless Internet access for the duration of the festival. The wifi network extends as far as the beach, said one technician.

So far, my main problem is finding a way to upload photos to my blog. It turns out that I needed to bring my digital camera dock -- without it, I can't transfer photos from my camera to my laptop! One option is to convince officials to purchase a memory-card reader for the duration of the festival. The other is to convince someone who has a card reader to let me transfer the photos to my USB memory stick. Until I resolve this issue, we're out of luck with photos :-(