Nice La Bella

The Greeks who founded the town called it Nikaia or "place of Nike" and when the Romans incorporated it into their Provincia they didn't bother changing it, they simply spelled it Nicaea.  Unlike Cannes and every town from here to Lisbon, Nice was never taken by the Saracens, as the Niceans stopped the invasion in 729, though the Moors still sacked and burned the town in 813, 859, and 880.  When the French took it from the Savoys in 1860 they called it Nice, but the locals still call it Niça or Nissa.

We had fun reading a number of signs written in Niçard around town.  Not quite Occitan (though some words look Catalan), not quite Italian, a dash of Portuguese, and you can tell French has muscled its way in.  We were able to actually decipher each word!  So all those years of Italian, French and Portuguese we've taken didn't entirely go to waste.

The Port of Nice.  iPhone 6 Plus.

Saint-Jean-Cap-Ferrat

Il y a une jeunesse mystérieuse
dans les vieilles pierres de
Saint Jean
––– Jean Cocteau (1889-1963)

Found written in a corner in Saint-Jean-Cap-Ferrat, where every child appears to have a nanny, old resident American acquaintances meet on the street by happenstance, people commute to the villas in the cap by helicopter, and the bricklayers and plumbers commute from Monaco. 

Peregrinus anchored at Anse de La Scaletta, in the Saint-Jean waterfront.  Maybe Cocteau's "mysterious youth" is just a side effect of more money than people know what to do with.  Leica Typ 114. 

Artistic license

In the poster, there is only one building between the iconic Carlton and Martinez hotels.  In real life, shot from Peregrinus at anchor, these two are a couple of streets away from each other.

But then again, what would a place like Cannes be without  a dose of artfulness, a bit of a sleigh of hand?

iPhone 6 Plus.  And never mind the fact that, in Cannes, there's usually a crew to drive the tender.

Leica Typ 114.  8:29 PM, 26 May 2016.

Cannes

This area of the Roman Provincia Nostra was well-populated and accessible by a major highway –the Via Iulia Augusta passed thru on its way from Antibes to Fréjus.  Unlike those towns, however, Cannes did not exist as a city, but merely as farms and factories along the coast.

With the collapse of security after the fall of the Empire, the area became largely depopulated, with a nadir in 891 when the Saracens invaded and held the territory for 80 years.  After William the Liberator kicked out the Moors in 972, reconstruction began, and Cannes proper first appears in a document from 1030.

It is largely an accident that turned Cannes into what it is today.  In 1834, the Lord Chancellor of Great Britain, Henry Brougham, was taking his daughter to Italy to take care of her respiratory ailment; but the Italian border, at Nice back then, was closed off because of the cholera.  Backtracking along the road, he spent a few nights at Cannes, and liked it so much, he built a magnificent villa here and launched it as an internationally fashionable resort town.

Peregrinus at anchor in the Rade de Cannes in front of the Boulevard de la Croisette.  26 May 2016, Leica Typ 114.

Cleaning day for Magic Carpet 3

Just arrived home from the PalmaVela 2016 regatta which ended Sunday, Magic Carpet 3, a Wally 100' and one the world's most famous racing boats, gets a thorough cleaning in the Vieux Port at St. Tropez: jacklines and foul gear gets hung out to dry in the foredeck, three large cases of all kinds of cleaners and soaps are brought dockside and onboard, wet-dry vacs and electric buffers are readied, and assorted mops, brushes and water-hoses lie about.  When your racing crew is a couple of dozen sailors, it's probably not too hard to find a handful to clean up afterwards.  

On Peregrinus, though, the sailing crew is down to two, so it's always quite a challenge for the Admiral to rope up cleaning crew after passages!

Check out the dodger on Magic Carpet 3: is it up to Bristol standards?  St. Tropez waterfront, 13 May 2013.  iPhone 6 Plus.

A passerelle in St Tropez

Saint-Tropez is a place of fancies and whims.  One could strut ones' fashions on this dining table, or dance on it: steps are thoughtfully provided.

iPhone 6 Plus.

Where the Genoese founded a republic

The Moors were kicked out of this region in 972, after almost a century of occupation.  Nonetheless, this part of the old Roman Province remained generally depopulated because the Saracens continued to pirate and raid for the next half-millennium, and, not coincidentally, because Provence was passed along during that time from the German Holy Roman Empire to the Spanish Kingdom of Aragon, and finally to the French kings. 

But under René, Count of Provence, a deal was struck in 1470 with a citizen of the Republic of Genoa: in exchange for defending the coast and building a fortress in St. Tropez, the Genoese would pay no taxes and largely self-rule.  And so sixty Genoese families migrated to St. Tropez and since then the city had its own navy and army which over the following century fought off pirates, Turks, and Spaniards at various times.  The city's privileges, eroded from time by the kings of France, were finally terminated under Louis XIV, in 1672.  

To this day, many family names in the St Tropez cemetery, if not most, are clearly Italian.

A side wall in St Tropez, 13 May 2016.  Peregrinus has anchored off for a couple of days.  iPhone 6 Plus.

Horse Trading

The Admiral and the Seaman went shopping for horses in Dourdan (Essone) with Jacqui and Adrian.

Jacqui testing a horse.  Frame captured from video taken by the Seaman.  iPhone 6 Plus, 21 March 2016

Exploring La Charité-sur-Loire With Friends

Adrian points out features of the extant features of the Cluniac church of Notre-Dame, consecrated by pope Pascal II in 1107, and the second largest church in Europe until the edification of Saint Peter's in Rome in 1506.  

The 1429 siege of La Charité was Joan of Arc's sole military defeat, other than her final capture during the sortie at Compiègne.

With Jan and Jacquie.  19 March 2016.

Sebastian

The Admiral adopted the Alférez at the turn of the century, as a six month old, the last of his litter, just before we moved to Miami.  He was our first cat, and because we did not want Sebastian to be lonely when we left the house, he opened the door for Philippe and Isabella not too long afterwards.  That was the first favor he did us.

He used up several cat lives.  In 2005 in Miami Beach, he ate the ribbon of a birthday balloon, which had to be surgically removed; the scar ran from neck to lower belly.  In 2009, he underwent a nuclear medicine treatment to combat an overeager thyroid.  In 2013, he was diagnosed with renal failure, and given three months to live.  No matter.  Not much later, he moved aboard, and went on to travel to six countries in two continents for the next two-and-half years.

Sebastian was devoted to the Admiral.  On land, in the air, or at sea, he curled at her side.  During her shifts sailing Peregrinus, for instance, he sat on her left, like a dependable co-pilot, no matter the time of day or night.  He found peace with the Admiral.  He lived his long life in no small part because he trusted her and meekly accepted from his Admiral whatever procedures and medications were needed, without complaint.

Some said he was a lucky cat, but in truth, we are the ones blessed to have had him with us, even if the years with him now seem all too short.  Sebastian went to rest, peacefully, in Cartagena, on January 23rd, 2016. 

The Admiral doing foredeck work, and so of course, Sebastian was there with her.  Águilas, Murcia, January 21, 2016.  Leica Typ 114.