St Tropez - Daaarhling, Cannes, Antibes and Nice. The St Tropez marina was booked out - we could see why when we took the dinghy in - huge huge boats all over the place! We anchored out but got moved on as we were in an unauthorised spot (along with about 5 other boats) but ended up in an even better place. The deeper part of the anchorage is full of very big super yachts. St Tropez is something else! Beautiful people and their shops in all the streets. Normal p...

We stayed a while at the Port Camargue marina waiting for the Gulf de Lion to make it's mind up about weather. The big blow we originally were going to hide from fizzled out but then a new one formed just at the end of our planned stay! We took the opportunity of not using the dinghy for a few days to get the leak patched properly. There are two very good French chandleries that we know of from the French Caribbean Islands so that was good for new glue. Shaunagh ...

After leaving Barcelona we started moving around the coast eastwards. Club Nautica Arenys - a nice little marina with a welcome pool, Palamos - a biggish town where we anchored out for a few days then attempted to stay in the bay of Roses area. The marinas here were either booked out or too small for us and the bays were not sheltered from southerlies. Finally we managed to book a mooring buoy at Montjoi. We turned up at 11.00 am only to find that it was booked f...

In the town square there was a dinosaur charging around. I took a photo and it came straight for me! After a chase and a quick nuzzle (very French) I saw a very funny incident. A man was walking his dog quite unaware of the dinosaur but his dog was going ballistic. He was shouting at it to behave when the dino tapped him on the shoulder from behind - the look on his face when he turned around..........

We left Bordeaux a week ago (after a quick visit to the wine museum) to go down river to Royan where Lagoon had a few bits and pieces to fix up on the boat, including a mysterious leak - of course! All of that has gone well and we are now waitingj for a weather window to cross the notorious Bay of Biscay. We all had our first experience of handling a new boat and navigation system along the river - very different to Chat Eau Bleu. Peter made an excellent job or d...