In the heart of Calanques National Park, Cassis is a quaint Provencal fishing village that has become a bit touristy and expensive compared to other fishing villages along the coast, according to some. But, if compared to former fishing villages like Saint Tropez, Cassis may be a bargain.
We are finally on the Mediterranean, the blustery days in western France are a distant memory, and it feels fantastic to be warm and near water again for a few days. It was nice to stay on the Quay in the harbour- even if the Airbnb was someone’s converted garage under their condo. https://www.airbnb.com/rooms/3265855. Every day, bus loads of tourists are dropped off for day trips in the village which makes it super crowded during the day but very quiet and relaxing in early morning and evenings. Some nights it felt like we had the entire harbour to ourselves.
The biggest tourist attraction was a boat trip to see the famous Calanques. A calanque is is a narrow, steep-walled inlet that is developed in limestone, dolomite, or other carbonate strata and found along the Mediterranean coast. This range extends for 20 km in length and 4 km in width along the coast between Marseille and Cassis. You could buy a ticket to see 3, 5, 8, or 9 calanques. Lisa needed some ‘down time,’ so Douglas hopped on board a boat with 15 German teenagers, 10 others, and set motoring up the coast. Sadly, it is just a boat ride. If you want to get off the boat and swim around or sun on one of the rocky beaches or snorkel or scuba, you will need to hire a different boat. Greece has numerous islands with calanques as does the Italian coast.
We ate at Chez Gilbert for lunch & dinner it was so delicious. Amazing fresh seafood! http://www.chezgilbert.net/ For lunch, Douglas accepted Lisa’s plate when it was delivered to the table and successful stole it. But all was well since those two share plates.
We met some tourists from Bruges, Belgium that have a second home here and come for the wine and sunshine. They helped us out with the menu. Cassis is known for their fresh, dry white wine which goes perfect with seafood. Cassis’ wine is produced in only 12 vineyards so it is not readily available outside of this appelation. We are learning that wine in France is identified through a specific region and there are over 300 appelations in France.
We also had a dinner at Nino’s http://nino-cassis.com/ which was good and the staff was very kind and welcoming.
So yes, we did stay in someone’s garage but it kinda felt like you were on a boat since it was so close to the harbour. Douglas, re-living a movie about life aboard a German submarine, kept calling the place, “Das Boat.”
Plus there was a tapas bar 10 feet from our garage Airbnb!
and we bought these rare double yolk eggs at the Farmer’s market…I was wondering why I was standing in line for an unusually long time to buy fresh eggs! In doing further research, hens that are between 20 months and 28 months have a high probability of laying double yoke eggs. A double yolk egg is formed when two ovulations take place almost at the same time and go down the oviduct together and both get encased in shell. Scramble!
