Plage de Pampelonne

The place is ridiculous.  In the morning, the megayachts leave St Tropez, Cannes and Antibes and race to anchor in front of this 3-mile beach.  From further afield, i.e., Cap Ferrat and Monaco, fast boats in the 30 to 80-ft range zoom in at 20 knots-plus to make it before lunch time.  And for the people unwilling to lounge on a fully crewed yacht for an hour to make the trip, the helicopters come in all day from Monaco, Menton, and other points.

The beach then hums with activity, but it is crowded.  Think Central Park on a sunny late spring weekend.

Then in mid afternoon, everyone commutes back to their harbours and villas, and only a handful of boats remain at anchor to watch the sunset, there where were hundreds of vessels laid at anchor just a few hours before.

And this is what we saw each day for three days at Pampelonne.  And let's not even talk about the nudist sectors of the beach.

Pampelonne before noon, only about 3/4ths full, looking south from Tahiti Beach.  Each flag marks a different "beach."  27 June 2016, iPhone 6 Plus.

Antibes

In the two months we spent on the Côte d'Azur, we saw evidence of la dolce vita everywhere.  Even in the refuse bins.

When we took out Peregrinus' household trash at the Port d'Antibes-Vauban marina, the container was nearly full.  Some harried yacht crewman had dumped his trash in front of the dumpster, and we just had to pull our iPhone camera out.  The remains of a bit of shopping spree laid there for the trashman to pick up: 24 bottles of Louis Jadot, 2 boxes of Chanel, 9 of Hermés, 3 of some fancy Italian apparel thing, and a few shoe boxes.

Antibes, 24 May 2016.  iPhone 6 Plus.

The Victory of the Alps

Huc usque Italia ab hinc Gallia.
———Antonine Itinerary, early III cent. (Wesse:206)

The Triumph was originally round.  Only four columns out of 12 have been restored. 

Built in the year 6 before Christ at the point the Romans considered the southern end of the Alps, the mountain immediately above Monaco, this monument celebrated Octavian Augustus' victory over the alpine peoples.

Forty-nine meters high, it marked at the time the border between Italy and Gallia.  It was built across the Via Iulia Augusta and was visible from the coastal sea routes to Spain.  

The Tropaeum Alpium from Peregrinus' anchorage at Saint-Jean-Cap-Ferrat.  19 June 2016, Leica Typ 114

Monaco...

... Is so very small. Much of what one sees when anchored out is actually France: the city of Beausoleil sits right uphill from Montecarlo.  

We arrived an afternoon into the Fontvieille harbour for provisioning and left the Zodiac less than 100 metres from the full-size Monaco Carrefour.  In the morning, we went Summer-clothes shopping in Montecarlo and it was easy to just leave the Zodiac among the large yacht tenders at the very corner of the Quai des États-Unis and Quai Albert 1er: we figured it would take the port employees a while to figure out that the Zodiac marked T/T Peregrinus did not actually belong to a harbour-dues paying mega-yacht!

Port Hercole from Peregrinus' Zodiac tender.  On the very left, the Rock of Monaco, with the princely palace and Monaco-Ville.  Behind the boats, La Condamine and above the built-up-area, the Tête de Chien mountain.  14 June 2016, iPhone 6 Plus.