Alba Provence D'Azur Hotel Sollies-Pont Hyères

... believe our luck. It was so nice. Still, warm and crystal clear water on sandy beaches. We had a quick swim but knew we had to leave to get to Avignon on time. We then decided that if we found a campsite that was open we would stay. The first 2 we came to were closed and we were sad...but around at st clair beach one was open! Woo hoo!!!! 2 very happy girls. That night we played in the sand like kids ...

We also took the short drive to Port Grimaud, to visit this small but new harbour town built in what was once marshland, but is now row after row of condos and homes built in a web of jetties to allow the homes to anchor their boats at their doorsteps. Of course, we would have rather spend our time on the beach, but with bad weather, Grimaud was a nice alternative.

... 1:30, so we looked in from outside the fence. I have a few pictures here of the ampitheatre. It was much smaller than the one in Orange, and in much worse state of repair. They had built modern seating and staging over top of the ruins, so that there wasn't much sense of what the original would have been like to attend events in.

Then, when leaving town, we saw some ruins over on the side of the road and stopped. It turned out to be a series of bases for ...

We had a plesant surprise yesterday - we went to Marseille and it was a great stop. From the magnificent Notre Dame Basilica with its sweeping views to the Mediterrean beach of Cassis. We even squeezed in a salad and crepe lunch...plus pizza for dinner.

... on a recent trip to Les Arcs with some beginners, the ski schools here are among the first to recommend and use shorter skis for beginners. The theory is that it’s easier to ski on blade type skis, and means you can start parallel turning straight away. You will need to return to your ski hire shop several times ...

So, Sophie has a friend named Line. That would be pronounced like Lyne, not line. Line has a husband named Romain. That would be pronounced Romon, not romain. Last year in August Sophie and I came to France to attend their wedding. It was my first time in the South of France and the whole thing was quite nice. Anyways, here we are a little over a year later going to the south of France again to attend their daughters christening. Their Daughter's name is Lily-Rose. No secret ...

The train brought us into Nice and we were tired so we caught a taxi to our hotel thinking that it wouldn't be expensive because the hostel was only 5 minutes away. The meter said that we owed 6 euros but the taxi driver insisted that we had to pay 12 euros because of the number of passengers, luggage and tax. We felt really ripped off but the people in the hotel ...

Today I celebrated "Le Mistral" (which is like a hurricane on a sunny day) by nearly drowning in the sea. Last night during dinner it suddenly arrived. For 2 days I had heard it was coming and I surmised it was some kind of special, predictable wind that made Marcel immensely happy. At about 9:30 pm last night, the curtains suddenly began to blow around, doors slammed all over the house, trees thrashed. Henriette explained some of the mystery that surrounds this ...

... Heather had phone booked. Then it was a stroll along the promenade to checkout the sights before walking to the second railway station so that we would know where to go for our country jaunt on Saturday. Still going we then walked back to the Ibis to book in for Sunday night, finally happy with our days work we stopped at a little pizzeria for some tea. Deciding we would have a couple of beers we ordered to medium, but when they ...