We Went

 
I know that I have put this picture on before but I love it and at the moment I cannot face sorting through the pile of boat pictures that I have in a dark chest that I cannot face opening. I left you on my last page in a beautiful garden in Cap Ferrat all sounding so iddylic and now I am taking you back to the boat.

I don't really feel like dwelling on the journey too much not for now anyway. It was my first voyage on a boat. We were going from Menton to Palma, quite exciting really, stopping in Monaco, ville franche and Cannes and then St Tropez. My favourite Market is in Cannes it is a covered market, not a beautiful building like Menton, practical but the market is fabulous if you go there it is called Marche Fourville, it is a short walk from the old port where we used to berth. I loved that first thing in the morning feeling in Cannes as much as anywhere, the roads newly washed the flowers watered the smell of the night before dampened into the day ahead soon to be burnt off by the sun.

Being with a bunch of boys meant that the girls who were in the minority generally ended up doing what the boys wanted, which usually involved a trip to a strip club on our night off. For me it was not a pleasant experience and thought the whole thing to be quite dull, so we would go to a pub, go to a restaurant, go to a night club to dance and then end up in some sleazy strip club at four in the morning, I would as often as not walk back to the boat on my own.

Pulling me out of the memory of dirty pavements and dark alley ways was always the fresh morning, which is probably why I liked the smell of the newly washed pavements and roads.

Cannes is where I go to buy my fish for the Bouillabaise I make, the market still has fish stands where the local fishermen sell their catch which is a rare thing nowadays. so you can buy the small rock fish necessary for making the bouillabase.

Anyway we went from Cannes to St Tropez and we joined the sail boat racing in the annual races there at the end of  September. The weather was cooler and the racing serious, we were joined by a lot of other sailors and I was the chief sandwich maker. Although I stayed working on the boat for so many years I never really become a sailor I found it all too scary, expecially when there was a lot of wind and the sails filled to capacity and we were ploughing ahead at 12 knots and sometimes faster, then in a race you have to manouvre the boat and the sails and not smach into another boat, which is what we did in St Tropez, it was an accident, both boats were too close, but we got hole in our hull and sea water started gushing in.

All the boys rushed into action to rig up a makeshift plank that would block the water from coming in. We limped slowely into the ship yard, where the boat had to come out of the water on the hard to be fixed.

Our next journey was to Palma, rough seas all the way, grey rainy days and plenty of seasickness. Smashing into the waves and having the sea swooshing over the top of the boat was a frightening experience for a new sailor. I preferred to stay inside in the dry. But becoming part of the crew on this ship also meant that I had to learn to sail and to navigate, and be part of the whole.

 

Comments

[elliebaker@aol.com]

Good to see you back here...I have missed your words and I miss you hugely...Love you xxx

[Kristi]

Enjoyed every word of your gritty and real story. Thank you, Tess! That's my kind of read. More please!