St Tropez

We decided on taking the rental car on a drive today. We left Cannes and followed the coastal road to the west. The first stop was St Maxime. The weather was perfect and the sea was reflecting the sunshine like jewels on the surface of the water. I can see why they call it Cote d’Azur.

We stopped several times to savour the amazing views back to Cannes with snow covered alps in the background. The villas in this area have a distinctly Spanish look with Terracotta and curved tiles overlapping. The rock around this area is terracotta red, and most of

the houses are built in that same colour. There are even cacti planted so it looks very Spanish.

After stopping at St Maxime we continued on to St Raphael and we had lunch in that beautiful seaside village, overlooking the Mediterranean Sea.

Before reaching St Raphael we pulled into a memorial park at the beach that the Americans landed on in WW2 in conjunction with D-Day. They landed at the beaches in this area (August 1944) and pushed the Germans northwards as the allies pushed from Normandy and the Riviera beaches in a pincer movement.

After lunch at St Raphael we continued around the bay to St Tropez, a very famous village being the hometown of Brigitte Bardot. This was a favourite spot in the 1960s for the jet setting crowd. It is a

quaint seaside location with a beautiful harbour and a character all of its own.

Then a 2 hour drive home with holiday traffic causing congestion on the main roads. We decided to take a less travelled route through the mountains, which provided some amazing scenic views of the hinterland.

We parked car under the Festival Centre where the Cannes Film Festival is held. Costs 22 euros for 24 hours. There is really nowhere on the street to park. There are so many incomprehensible parking restrictions that the parking station is the best option.