It's Bastille Day! Or as the locals call it, simply "le quatorze Juillet". Arrived back from Baux des Provence thinking nothing would be happening on 13 July, to find Villefranche in full party mode!
After wandering down to the waterfront for an aperitif, we (me and my new Villefranche posse!) discover people starting to gather on the waterfront in place of all the usual restaurant tables which is a bit of a clue something's about to happen.
As soon as the sun starts to go down, boats fully decked out with flags and lights start arriving and throwing huge armfuls of flowers into the waiting crowd. Something to do with the pirate history of the town - apparently they used to give flowers to the village once a year - or something like that. I couldn't get much sense out of the waiter when I asked him what the significance was. But that was after my third vodka so maybe it was me...
And then the fireworks started - a fantastic display and all set to really cheesy 80s music - brilliant! Rob - their opening song was "It's Raining Men" - not sure if that had something to do with the pirates but I thought of you.
And just when we thought it was all over we toddled off home only to stumble across a street party in the middle of the old town - double brilliant!
A really smooth (and really large) black DJ working his tunes. I love Europe in that you can be in a small French town and just run into a street party with some musician doing his thing at midnight.
How cool is that?!
No comments:
Post a Comment