DAY 25 - 21/10/2007
Oh missed opportunities and the open minded Dutch. Because the camp is empty they only opened the women’s side of the nearest shower block, so Roger had to go way over the other side of the camp. However the open minded Dutch couple not only both used the women’s showers but undressed in the open space not in the cubicle. Sorry you missed it Roger, she was so Miss Holland. She was also so nice and gave up her shower to the modest Kiwi because mine wouldn’t work. In her half nakedness she did try and get it going.
We have spent half the morning doing laundry, eating, internet and finishing our drive by tour of the Riviera by driving through Cannes (no movie stars spotted), St Raphael and St Tropez. It is raining so there are no artificial bronze gods or goddess on the beach. There was an over 50 bronzed something with leopard print, 6 inch heels and lots of bling bling in the Laundromat. She brought mere male with her, also adorned with gold bling. His sole job was to put the money in the machine and look very sorry for leaving bits of paper in his pockets. You can pay a lady to do your ironing. I watched as she ironed and folded a shirt perfectly in a tenth of time it takes me. She is as paranoid as my mother and even irons tea towels, flannels and socks. A rich family had a basket of kids T-Shirts ironed, I dread the thought of her poor heart if she visited certain relatives of mine. A lady came in and wound the ironing lady up, Leopard pants got her really going and there was fist waving and talk of a fight. I would have thought you wouldn’t argue with a lady with a hot iron. I have decided that Laundromats are interesting places.
McDonalds is also an interesting place in Antibes. You can bring your luggage and hand bag accessories in and leave them unattended. A pink track suit wearing old lady came in with her dog zipped up in her hand bag. The dog’s head was poking out only so that it could breathe and wouldn’t escape. The lady disappeared to the toilets for her daily ablutions and then came back with a bottle of milk for the dog which it licked out of the cap.
We were heading for Toulon but it was such a massive city we bypassed it for something smaller on the way to Marseille. It was interesting to note that like Auckland, city drivers can’t handle wet weather after a dry spell and we saw some great accidents. As we recall the Toulon accidents so probably is some very small school in some very small street in a very small town. School gets out at 4.30pm to make up for the long lunch and all the mothers come to pick up their little precious. They park half on the road with hazard lights flashing. Then one of those once in 100 year events occurs where a very large campervan takes a wrong turn and decides to squeeze down said very small street made worse by said badly parked cars in said peak hour. It actually left the GPS unit stunned that she lost her voice for 10 minutes. I have to say I inhaled more than exhaled especially as some mothers weren’t phased and hurtled their children out into the traffic, opened doors and backed out of car parks in front of a large moving van.
British holiday camp on the Riviera