We got up earlier today so that we could go hike the calanques early in the day. But we needed sunscreen and a snack for the hike, so we had to go into town first; we picked up some cheese at the Casino market, bread at the nearest boulangerie, and sunscreen at a convenient pharmacy…and then we had to walk 30 minutes or so to the trailhead at Port Miou. So we were really ready at 11am.
A school group had arrived just before we did and they took off up a steep slope. We followed them for a few minutes until we ran into two hikers coming down the slope. I asked them if we were going the right way to reach Port Pin, the next calanque; they said that it would be much easier if we turned around and followed the main route, which was clearly marked with green and red markings. We followed their advice.
We’d walked the first few hundred meters yesterday, when everything was quiet. Today, we heard loud cheering coming from the other side of Port Miou – there were huge crowds on the overlook watching (and cheering for) the competitors in a kayak race ending at the boat basin.
We walked to the end of Port Mieu – so far, so good!
There were two routes leading to Port Pin; we took the one with the most walkers. It took us up some very slippery rocks; we managed to stay vertical, but it wasn’t easy. When we got to the top of a climb, we could see the beginning of the Port Pin calanque…and we looked at the path we’d have to follow and all the slippery rocks making up the path and decided to turn back.
The first person we saw when we turned around was wearing a very interesting t-shirt (well, it was interesting if you worked for IBM 35 years ago).
We got back to the junction and tried the other route; the footing was much better, but it was windy and we were tired, so we turned around once again and walked back to our AirBnB, enjoying the sights along the way.
We had our bread and cheese (and the last of a bottle of local white wine) in our AirBnb; it was delicious.
After resting for a bit, we set out for town again, and happened to notice an alley across the street connecting our street with one farther down the hill. We decided to follow it.
At the bottom of the alley, we could see the water, and a big slab of flat rock that looked ideal for sunbathing.
A moment later, we saw someone coming out of the water, and we realized that we’d found the naturist beach we’d seen from the boat on our calanque tour yesterday. We continued our walk to town, where we each bought a bathing suit for use at other beaches, such as La Grande Mer.
We’d made dinner reservations on TheFork to go to Le Naio, but when we got there, they were locked up tight!
We waited for a few minutes, then gave up and walked down the waterfront in search of dinner. We’d reached La Vielle Auberge and were looking at their menu when we heard someone calling us – it was Kevin and Kerry from our Rhône cruise, and their daughter who currently lives in Paris. They invited us to join them and we had a very pleasant evening.
We’re not going to try to walk the calanques tomorrow. Maybe we’ll try our new bathing suits. Or maybe we’ll do without. Vive la France!