Day 7 (James): Sanary-Sur-Mer — Toulon — Saint-Tropez — Saint-Raphael — Cannes (La Bocca)
Woke up in Sanary-sur-Mer (on sea) after our night on the booze last night. The plan today is to follow the coastal roads headed towards Italy hitting Toulon, Le Lavandou, Cavalaire-sur-Mer and Saint-Tropez.
There was a stark difference between the weather from last night and we were back to good old grey skies and sideways rain. Our first stop was Toulon for breakfast and coffee (standard).
The rest of the day turned out to be more of a ‘sight-seeing-from-the-car’ kind of day as storms were due along the coast and most of these places had shut for season. The gale force winds were battering the sea and the tide was high all day.
By 13:15 we had already reached Saint-Tropez. Saint-Tropez is known for its beaches and nightlife… neither of which we would experience today. We made an executive decision to keep truckin’ along and promised to visit these places another time… even the vineyards were barren.
What this meant was that we actually gained a lot more ground than we’d planned and so set our sites on further along the coastline. We had a quick stop in Saint-Raphaël for coffee and to book tonight’s accommodation. We found a cheap stay just before Cannes and set off again.
Mol volunteered to drive the rest of the way as I’m a sucker for a sea view no matter how bad the weather.
The wind had really picked up at this point and we saw that the storm we’d avoided since Metz had finally caught up to us. Molly drives an extremely square car (Skoda Citigo) which for the most part is just another thing I tease her about. In reality, what this actually means is that the car has zero aerodynamics and extremely dangerous in strong winds (very light winds if I’m honest but strong winds are worse). The car rocked as the wind gained force and we set our sights on our shelter for the night before dark.
We arrived in La Bocca (15 minutes outside of Cannes) and searched around for our hotel. After a quick glance at where google maps said it have been, we could only find a McDonalds in its place. Then we looked up. Google was correct. Mental.
With the storm in full force we decided not to explore Cannes tonight but instead find a market and buy some food for the hotel room.
We grabbed some grub and spent the night watching the storm from our window. For less boring than it sounds.
