The South of France

I forgot the first lesson of blogging: always make a back up before you try to post it online. This morning I tried to upload last night's blog and lost the whole thing. This is my attempt at trying to remember the memorable words I wrote, which probably are only memorable to me.

Friday 5 April 2013

Stupid o'clock comes again but stupid o'clock is acceptable when it means a flight somewhere new and today I'm going somewhere new. The 5am wake up call was not welcome but not a cause for swearing.

Gatwick Airport Terminal 1 is a bit of a dump but we managed to find something resembling a pub for coffee and pastries before boarding. Actually, the airport experience was quite straightforward because David had kindly checked in online for us the night before so we only had to queue for security. Unfortunately it was at the point of going through security that David lost his boarding pass. It's no wonder he isn't allowed to be in charge of tickets when we go places!

We had a conversation only a couple of days ago about our match tickets for this weekend's rugby. David was certain that he hadn't seen the tickets arrive through the post and, in a panic, was frantically going through months of unopened post to try and find them.

Once I knew what he was looking for, I asked, "Do you mean the tickets we collected from Welford Road and that you immediately handed to me so you wouldn't be responsible for losing them?"

Those would be the tickets in question. Panic over.

The actually flight was short and pleasant. British Airways is such a pleasure to travel with after flights we've taken in the past few years with RyanAir and similar, though we had a moment of worry when the pilot couldn't remember that we were flying to Marseille. Fortunately he also advised us that his first officer would be doing the flying.

We didn't spend very long in Marseille but we had a few hours sitting in the sun in front of a cafe drinking wine. I ended up quite squiffy and a bit sunburned but it was a fantastic afternoon. David and JR promised me champagne for passing my Probate Practice exam, which I sat in January but received the results for Tuesday. We ordered a bottle but the waiter was kind enough to tell us it wasn't chilled. Missed out there but it wouldn't have been nice drinking warm champagne.

It was only a short train journey by TGV from Marseille to Toulon and we arrived safely. Our hotel is practically attached to the Stade Mayol where Leicester is playing on Sunday, but we're only staying here two nights, then moving a mile away to a different, albeit nicer, hotel because this one was fully booked for Sunday night. It's a cheap and cheerful Etap. It's clean and comfortable so I don't mind going basic.

JR's friend and frequent rugby travelling companion Tony is joining us tomorrow. That will be interesting. Tony is one of those people who is usually drunk but rarely boring. I already have a lot of Tony Stories from Rome, Dublin and Cardiff, and one of these days I should probably write them down for posterity. For now, I will wait and see what this weekend brings.

Wandering around Toulon, you can see that it is a lot like other French cities in that parts of it look like they are waiting for plasterers and painters to show up. Many buildings look like they haven't been plastered since the reign of Louis XIV and I don't think any of the shutters have been painted since they were originally hung. Next to all of these older buildings are newer tower blocks that look exactly the same as those we have in Britain.

The town is very clean and the people are extremely welcoming, considering we have been walking around with Leicester Tigers logos glaring from our clothing. Locals have stopped us just to tell us how welcome we are. Like many French towns, even if someone you speak to doesn't know English, if you at least make an effort to speak French, they will go out of their way to help you. Okay Paris is a little more stand-offish but not as much as I had expected when we visited last year.

We had drinks by the marina and admired the expensive boats that places like this usually attract. This seems to also be a stop off for Mediterranean cruises as there were two large cruise ships further out in the port. It's easy to forget that this is a port city when you aren't actually overlooking the sea.

Unfortunately, with our body clocks being off a bit having been on our travels since stupid o'clock, we were a bit late looking for somewhere to eat dinner. Toulon, or at least this part of it near the marina, shuts down at 7.30pm! We were able to find a Chinese restaurant that was still open and the food was fantastic. A recommendation for visitors to Toulon: the China Moon by the Stade Mayol.



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