St Raphaël

Ooops, I missed writing about our stays in St Raphaël in September, Antibes in October, and our return to Cambridge last week.

I did have work to catch up with, we were busy making the most of spending time with my family, the sun, the food, the walks, learning the electric guitar (yes that's a weird new one, thank you Cuong) but ultimately, the main reason for this massive procrastination was a rising dread about the looming date of our return to the UK. There are many worse places to live in of course, and Cambridge is a lovely city, but after living here a few decades, it is time to leave. It is likely to take us between 6 months and a year, perhaps more, but unless life takes another unexpected turn, at the horizon there is a clear target back to the sea and sun.

So after exploring Caen, La Rochelle, Cognac, Andarnos, Hendaye, Barcelona, Valencia, Denia, Torremollinos, Cagnes-Sur-Mer, St Raphael and Antibes, where are we heading to? Let me talk about our last two stops before. Today, I'll write about St Raphaël, and in the next few days, I will catch up with our summary of Antibes, our return to the UK, and our final conclusion after a year of travels in France and Spain!

St Raphaël, nice seafront but a bit of a slight twilight zone feel

The best thing about St Raphaël, an hour and a half East of St Tropez, was the location of our Airbnb 2 minutes from 5 rocky or sand beaches, lined by trees and a path turning Didi and my morning walks into peaceful joyful moments. Temperature was ideal, Didi was allowed on the rocky beaches, and I amused myself watching seniors practicing daily the "longe-côte". That's basically large groups of 70+ men and women energetically walking along the coast in the sea, since the main pristine sandy beach is quite shallow with water just raising above their waists. Other seniors just lounge on the beach showing off their designer swimwear for the ladies, or for the gentlemen, puffing their tanned chests trying to catch the eye of those fiercely independent ladies.

Yes, St Raphael is THE place to be for well-off senior citizens, to socialise, do lots of stuff and gerally enjoy themselves. I'd say in the street there is about 1 youth to 50 seniors. A tiny handbag in any shop will set you back by a minimum of 600 Euros, poodles furcuts look like works of art, and pearl or ruby necklaces adorn their owners' necks. There's a huge casino to wear one's sparkles, cafés everywhere and the yummiest pâtisserie we've tested in France so far. Thank goodness, we found a cheap but tasty Kebab place for our weekly takeaways!

The one and only nightclub, just one minute from our flat and which used to host the likes of David Ghetta and be a magnet for the city's sparse youth, was sadly closed a few years ago due to a series of sea floodings and drug trafficking issues, we are told. Going out now requires a 20 minute treck to the neighbouring more... erm populist town called Fréjus.

Fréjus's sea front has a lower standing feel, a large population of less well-off people of diverse nationalties and tourists on lower budget. Although I still had to bling up to be allowed in the club and O, poor me, actually wear a dress instead of a pair of jeans, the contrast between the two towns is illustrated by lightly disturbing detail: strolling on my walk on the St Raphael sea front, I counted... 36 French flags!!! 36! Not something unusual in America, but France?! My sister had warned me the National Front French right wing party was doing pretty well in this city but those flags made things a tad uncomfortable.

Let's hope at least the police here have a sense of humour since it was home to one of the most famous French comedians, Louis de Funès, who performed a satyre of local cops in a 1960s series called St Tropez police. He was an admirer of Charlie Chaplin, who inspired his acting style.

Incidentally, we also found out the owner of our AirBnb was the former chief police commissioner of the city of Fréjus. Here's one of his books on the living room shelf. So we left the place very clean. 😬😬😬

We did enjoy seeing older people having a good time, and all folks we talked to were smiley and friendly, not the horrible nationalist snobbish racists type, then again, how to tell for sure? So... not a place we would quite consider settling in, although we had a really pleasant, peaceful stay.

To feel at ease within the environment and making the most out of the many haberdashery stores around, I reconnected with my crafty side and crochetted my first two Amigurumis, it's a skill I got thanks to my teenage years bestie Maria, who taught me how to make crochet scarves and doilies when we were just 11!(Hi Maria, and thank you! 😊)

Towards the end of our stay, Cuong spoiled me for my big birthday. He indulged my predilection for Chinese old series and wore a wig the whole day. The joke backfired a bit on me when he refused to take it out for dinner. The Raphaëloix/ses we passed and restaurant staff tried really hard not to laugh the whole evening, since they didn't seem too sure whether Cuong was being ethnic or wearing a wig, nobody would want to upset the PC brigade, would they? Wigs aside, to dampen my growing passion for Amigurumi and to relight my youthful spark, he got me this gorgeous noisy baby! That'll keep me busy for a few years, RoooOOCK ON!

Since St Raphaël is only an hour from my family, we enjoyed meeting at the scenic nearby Plage du Débarquement, known by locals as a fantastic location for scuba diving and monstruously big techno-picnic. Here are my cool niece and nephew!

And here are a few pictures of the surroundings. Mum also visited us and we browsed second hand books laid down on a table, when I saw one titled "Dien Bien Phu". A few days later, I was in the middle of reading the bit about the General De Lattre when I saw the St Raphaël main Promenade was named after him. 🤔