Toulon Bay

Rade de Toulon and Iles de Porquerolles - 3 June
Sorry but Toulon is a major French Navy port and they all came to visit me, Frigates, Sea Attack fighter bombers (recognition not good enough to give you a name) and this nuclear SM.
Even got a waterbourne flying display - we would never get away with this in the Solent. I seriously thought that they had seen I was a British Flagged yacht and were using me as the aiming mark! Magnification was about x2 so he was close!
Having transited the Rade de Toulon, bypassing the city itself which is described as a dirty Portsmouth!!, I anchored for the night off Iles de Porquerolles. It is not specifically a nature reserve but was privately owned until recently and, rather like the Iles de Brehat off the Brittony coast, there are not cars and transport is foot or bicycle. Unlike Brehat, it is not completely ticketyboo, more temperate jungle and wild. A bit of a yacht haven with a really nice anchorage is a well protected bay from the South.
Rowed ashore to the sweet little port where the locals are happly ripping off the tourists who come by boat from Toulon but without the pretention of the coastal ports. Everything is very amature by comparison.
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