Our day at the seaside

By Wednesday my cold had taken its hold and I decided to stay back where I did nothing more strenuous than moving the deck chair into the shade and turning the pages of my book. Harry, Margot and Jim took off to the seaside at Sanary-sur-Mer. So Harry has written the following:

We wandered through the village where another market was in full swing and had a picnic lunch in a shady spot near the waterfront. We had been told that there could be a considerable queue for the boat trip and so while Jim stood first in line and read his book Margot and I went for a stroll around the shops but bought nothing as they were closed for lunch. This is a daily occurrence and you often find that even the petrol shops and banks are closed. On returning to Jim we found him and about 30 others were waiting for tickets. When we could board, being the outdoor kiwis we are, we raced the open top deck to get a good view of the coastline (even so it was difficult to get photos without heads in them). The boat crew provided some commentary as we sailed along, but it wasn't alot of help to me as it was in French. Anyway, quite a picturesque and rugged coastline - quite spectacular as they jutted vertically out of the sea - and they offered the perfect opportunity for those game enough to test their rock climbing skills. Doghead rock was aptly named as you can see (I reckon it had the face of a boxer). There were only a few little beaches that you could swim in and many of these were only accessible by sea. We noticed a few sunbathing on rocks (some with clothes and some without) with no chance of having a swim. It was amusing to see that many other cruise boats arrived at the nudist rock at the same time as we did - we wondered if this was co-incidence or planned.





On the way home, we made a short detour to the airport at Marseilles where I picked up a rental car for us. Margot and I wandered around rental car companies asking for Class A cars at a reasonable price and after four offers of Prestige cars as they had no small cars available (I needed two gold credit cards to take up the offer) we were offered a Toyota Yaris Diesel (brand new) which had 4000 kms on the clock - how could I refuse!! I drove back to Puyricard with a smile on my face and didn't mind if I got lost cos it was a rare opportunity to drive a Toyota in the European Union.