Port Vauban

After spending the morning doing translations for Luigino, who is putting on a Bannockburn exhibition in Falkirk, and part of the afternoon drawing up demolition documents for the works department of the town who are handling the paperwork for our facade repairs, I thought I deserved a walk, preferably where there weren't too many people. I headed for the Fort Carré, skirting the yacht basin and the repair yards. It's surprising how many of the yachts need repairs: there is an army of tradesmen and Aussies busy on the trim of these vessels. The activities include upholstery for the acres of sunbathing mattresses, electronics and electrics for the gizmos sprouting on the bridge decks, caulking and holystoning for the teak decks (think Caillebotte again), and even specialists in gold leaf. That last one puzzled me, until I realised there was hardly a vessel whose name wasn't loudly picked out in gold, the size and thickness of the lettering usually in direct proportion to the naffness of the name.

Beyond this opulence lies the real heart of the harbour, the repair yards, where every closely packed portacabin and shipping container seems to hide welders, glass fibre repairers, and motley rigging specialists, all working extremely hard. Between the rusting containers and the half dismantled boats, there are weeds, old car tyres and bales of decomposing cable. Definitely not chic, and not even tidy, this place feels real, and it is locals who are working, not antipodean year-outers. Next to these outcrops of reality, there are small landing stages belonging to clubs and associations, usually advertising, via a handwritten notice, their next homely and probably very sympathique outing, replete with pastis, barbecue and boules. This is definitely not the style of the very swish and exclusive International Yacht Club of Antibes, whose grandiose smoked glass and concrete headquarters, with helipad, looks down on the humble huts from the other side of the water.