Bouillabaisse time!

Marseille gets a lot of bad press, often unjustly so. People often associate this vibrant, happening city with gang violence and dodgy dealings. Sure, those things exist in Marseille (otherwise it wouldn't be Marseille, right?), but there's much more to the place than those negative stereotypes.

Now, one of those things is Bouillabaisse, possibly the tastiest fish soup there is. A dish I'm rather partial to. So when Mathilde's colleagues suggested we join them for a proper Marseille bouillabaisse, we didn't need much time to think about it before replying with a resounding "yes".

The rendez-vous was at Marina des Goudes, a place tucked away in a small fishing port at the outskirts of Marseille. The place is located in pretty stunning surroundings, around the calanques, impressive rock formations that dot the seaside between Marseille and Cassis. And the Marina itself is just as one would imagine a port in this part of the world.

OK, and what about the bouillabaisse, then, you ask ? Well, the nice thing about this place is that they serve a proper traditional bouillabaisse (as it's the local speciality, there are plenty of places selling rather poor imitations of it). Another great thing about the place is that it's not touristy at all, unlike some of the places in the town centre. And probably it's a bit less heavy on the wallet as well (having said that, bouillabaisse is always rather expensive).

We were joined by Julie (who is almost a local - the recommendation for this place comes from her), Aurelien, Charlotte and Julien for the feast. We predictably had a great time, chatting away, drinking wine, and of course, enjoying the bouillabaisse.

After the feast (which took a good couple of hours - if you ever plan to have a Bouillabaisse, plan a whole afternoon for it, and forget about having a dinner afterwards!), we decided to head into the town centre for a bit of culture - so we headed off to the fancy MuCEM museum, which had been built in the Vieux Port a couple of years ago, when Marseille was cultural capital of Europe.

Actually, it was getting a bit late, and we had a theatre play to go to in Nice, so we decided not to just check out a temporary exhibition and not visit the main museum, and just walk around the nearby Fort Sain-Jean, a lovely place which offers some fantastic views over the View Port.

And then, time to drive back to Nice. This visit once more confirms my view that Marseille is a pretty cool place, which deserves more visitors than it currently gets!

Mini road trip with Chie and Geoff

Me and Mathilde had a bit of a dilemma for getting back from Auvergne to Nice - thing were complicated by the fact that we didn't have a car, and there wasn't a convenient train station with a direct train connection to Nice in the vicinity. The perfect solution presented itself, since Geoff and Chie were planning a bit of a road trip around France before heading back to the UK. So our masterplan then, was to drive through Auvergne down to Marseille, from where me and Mathilde could handily catch a train to Nice.

So we got up bright 'n early, and started our drive southward through the gorgeous, snow-covered landscapes of Auvergne. The plan was to stop for lunch in Puy-en-Velay, a town which I've wanted to visit for quite some time. The drive up there was rather magnificent (we were riding in a sturdy Range Rover, and felt quite safe in spite of the somewhat wintery conditions). The highlight on the way to Puy-en-Velay was no doubt the stunning located Château de Polignac, perched on its hilltop. Unfortunately there was no time to visit, so we just enjoyed the view from the roadside, and pushed on to Puy-en-Velay.

We arrived well before noon, so decided to get the mandatory touristy stuff out of the way before getting lunching. Puy-en-Velay is famous for three things, mainly: the cathedral, lentils and lace making. It's also one of the most picturesque towns in France, at least based on photos I'd seen of the place. And for sure the initial impression does not disappoint - upon arrival, we were treated to a nice panorama of the town, with its main sights in plain view (the cathedral, the iron statue of the Virgin Mary overlooking the town on its hilltop, and the Chapelle St-Michel-d'Aiguilhe, seemingly impossibly perched on its narrow rock spire...). 

We crossed the pleasant old town (stopping by in a lace shop - it is after all the local speciality), and climbed up the hill to the famous Cathédrale Notre-Dame du Puy, a UNESCO world heritage site, and a major stop on the Santiago de Compostella. The cathedral still retains features dating back to the 5th century, with the bulk of the construction being from the 12th century. It is indeed a very impressive building, both on the outside and the inside.

Having checked out the cathedral, we made our way up the Rocher Corneille, which houses the famous statue of the Virgin Mary (one interesting historic detail for a pub quiz: the statue is built from 213 Russian cannons taken during the siege of Sevastopol!). The main reason to walk up here are the fantastic views around the city - certainly worth the hike!

The touristy bit done, time for what's really important - lunch! It turned out to be a bit of a challenge to find an open restaurant in Puy - but in the end we found a very nice restaurant indeed called Les Archers. Not a very fancy place, just a nice little place offering typical local fare (well, actually, more Lyon fare than Auvergne fare - but then Lyon isn't that far away actually), run by a very nice couple (Chie actually ended up buying one of their wine bottles, which she took a liking to!).

Time to leave Puy-en-Velay then - the perfect place for a short stop I must say. The place was certainly worth the wait - I'm happy we made it finally! On to Marseille then.

We arrived evening time, just in time to check into our apartment, before heading off for dinner. The apartment, which we'd booked kind of last minute on Airbnb, was rather stunningly located, with a great view over the old port. Can't get much better in terms of location that that in Marseille! We didn't have time to spend much time at the flat, as we were already running later for our dinner reservation.

We'd booked a real Marseille institution for the occasion - Le Brasserie des Catalans, one of THE places in Marseille apparently to have that famous bouillabaisse. And indeed it was quite an experience! The bouillabaisse was rather pricey (as is always the case for proper boillabaisse), but delicious. And I really liked the place as well - the place has a real proper retro-Marseille feel to it. The main attraction being Michelle, who has been operating the restaurant since he was a young chap (apparently he still runs the place the same way as he did 50 years ago). A proper Marseille experience!

The next day, we got up after a good night's sleep, eager to explore Marseille. We started with the classic stuff, walking along the old port, checking out the fishermen selling their fare, not that numerous anymore, sadly enough. Geoff and Chie being architects, we of course had to have a look at Norman Foster's Vieux Port Pavillion as well, a sort of huge mirror suspended by 8 pillars.

Our "architectural walk" continued up to MuCEM (a museum dedicated to the Mediterranean and its inhabitants). The museum itself is nothing to write home about, but the building complex for which its the focal point is pretty nice.

We then made our way to Le Panier, a most charming part of Marseille. It's what could be called "Old Marseille", a really cool place to walk around.What I like about the panier is that in spite of being a picturesque place, it's still retained a real residential, Marseillan spirit (unlike old Nice for example, which is a real tourist trap). We visited the famous Vieux Charite, a former almshouse (a damn impressive one!), which houses an architectural museum these days.

The next stop was obvious - Le Corbusier's Cité radieuse, a housing complex located in the suburbs of Marseille. At its town, the concept was revolutionary, due to a lack of housing, the French State asked Le Corbusier to revolutionalize building construction and invent a new way of life. The concept of the Cite is essentially a big high-rise building, entirely composed of modular "housing units", each housing a family. Optimization of space was of essential importance, and indeed the housing units do that very well. 

Another revolutionary concept was to integrate all the services needed by the
inhabitants (shops, restaurants, schools and so forth) in the building complex itself. It was to be a kind of self-sustained mini-city.

The place is indeed very fascinating - some of the original principles are still maintained (there is a restaurant, a few shops, and an art gallery). And the views from the rooftop are quite incredible. Happy to have visited the place finally, we've wanted to do that for quite some time!

That brought an end to our mini-road trip, as Chie and Geoff continued their trip Westwards towards Montpellier, and we had a train to catch to Cagnes. Our trip back turned out to be a bit of an adventure. As we showed up a bit early, we originally wanted to leave our bags in a locker and walk around a bit in Marseille, but alas 'twas not to be (as the metal detector was broken, nothing to be done...). So we decided to change our tickets for an earlier train. Fatal mistake... Our train did leave on time, but ominously stopped after half an hour or so. After some impatient waiting, the announcement came, our locomotive had broken down. So we waited, and waited, and waited. And finally left, about 2 hours late... (to make things worse, a crazy yoga guy "entertained" us and everybody else in our wagon with his life philosophy and his yoga exercises...). Cheers SNCF!

Anyway, in spite of this anti-climax, we were very happy indeed with our little road trip, but happy to be back home in Cagnes!

Day out in Marseille

Today was a public holiday, which was pretty good timing given the fact that Janne and Katja are in the neighbourhood. My hope had been to take them off the beaten track to show them some of the amazing local nature we're blessed with in this part of the world.

But alas, the weather decided to stay poor, so we decided to go for a more urban destination - Marseille. It's one of those places that has more to offer than meets the eye - it's a "proper city" with its own distinctive character where there's plenty of stuff to see and do, in spite of the bad press the place sometimes unfairly gets.

We decided to stop off at Aubagne, since it's kind of conveniently located on the way, nice stop before an early lunch in Marseille. Unfortunately, there wasn't really much to do in Aubagne on a rainy day like this (the main tourist attraction, a museum dedicated to the famous Provencal writer Marcel Pagnol, was shut) - we were treated to the rather unique spectacle of the foreign legion (their HQ are actually in Aubagne) parading around the main square (today was a public holiday in honour of the the armistice that was signed to end World War I).

We arrived in Marseille just in time for lunch. I'd booked a restaurant I found on Tripadvisor conveniently located in the port, named La Table du Fort. Quite a good choice again, even if the place had a bit of a pretentious, wannabe feel to it. Quite different from the little, cozy restaurant where we'd eaten in Peillon the other day. Still, no complaints about the food - all excellent stuff (if a bit pricey).

Our appetites sated, we headed off to explore Marseille. We naturally started with the port, walking along the newly renovated quays (Marseille was a European capital of culture last year), checking out the cool mirror construction by the fish market, making our way all the way up to the Fort-Saint-Jean and the newly built MUCEM (an architecturally impressive but otherwise somewhat disappointing museum dedicated to the Mediterranean). We were quite happy in that the constant rain had finally stopped.

Still, we didn't have to wait long for it to start dripping down a bit again, which lead us to the decision to jump on the touristy train, which took us up to what cold be considered the main touristy sight of Marseille  -  Notre-Dame-de-la-Garde. Rather aptly named (translated into English, Our Lady the guard), this basilica perched at the highest natural point of Marseille at 149 meters, literally watches over the port and the rest of the city. The views are quite simply astounding, especially since the sun finally decided to reveal itself! The neo-Byzantine church is quite impressive as well, unfortunately we didn't have a lot of time to explore it, as the little train was waiting to take us back to the port ;-)

Before heading back towards the Cote d'Azur, we decided to have a walk around one of my favourite parts of Marseille, Noailles, just off Canebieres, the main street of Marseille (which, even though it's a word for Cannabis, refers to the hemp rope that was once made here). Walking around Noailles is really like stepping onto another country or continent, the place feels more like Cairo or Marrakesh than a major French city, with its street sellers, shisha bars and tea shops.

That brought an end to a most interesting day out in one of the most fascinating cities of France!

Marseilles mini-break

Me and Mathilde have a nice yearly (or, rather, bi-yearly) tradition, whereby we treat each other to surprise weekends as birthday presents. And this sunny Friday, it was my turn to treat Mathilde to her surprise trip.

This time, I had picked Marseilles. We went there a couple of years ago, but didn’t really have time to discover everything this great city has to offer. So I figured the place merited another visit. We arrived in the Vieux Port around 11 AM, so had a bit of time to check into our hotel (which was handily located near the Vieux Port), and have a walk around, before lunch. The Vieux Port was as animated as expected (with the fishermen selling their daily catch) – a pity about the road works that surrounded the port…

For lunch, I had booked a table at The Ruhl, a kind of legendary place famed for their Bouillabaisse. It’s one of the three restaurants behind the “Marseille Bouillabaisse Charter”, which attempts to set some rules as to how this Marseille culinary institution should be prepared. Not a bad idea, considering that the bouillabaisse most restaurants sell is a pale imitation of the real thing. The Ruhl is rather stunningly situated on the Corniche, a scenic road that hugs the coastline around Marseille. The bouillabaisse was, from what we could tell, prepared according to all the rules in the book. Most people probably think it’s a kind of fish soup – but a bouillabaisse is much more than that. There are at least three different types of fish used from an “approved list” (all have to be freshly fished in the ‘Med), and the resulting broth is served first (together with bread and rouille – a kind of mayonnaise), and the fish meat only afterwards. It is a truly memorable culinary experience – and definitely hits the spot! All in all, an excellent start to our weekend!

The coastline with its beaches around the Ruhl was really inviting, and the weather was just stunning, so we decided to hit the “beach of the profet” and bask ourselves in the sunshine for a bit, and swim in the beautiful med. A nice way indeed to digest all that fish. After a couple of hours of chilling out, we made our way back to the hotel.

Before the evening program, we decided to have a walk around Marseilles a bit. We started our walk at the Cannabiere, the legendary main street of Marseilles. It’s maybe lost some of its glamour and bustle over the years, but it’s still a lively place to stroll down. From there, we made our way into one of the famous quarters of Marseille, La Plaine.  It’s a pretty nice and lively place to walk around – a kind of edgy, trendy place. Reminded us of some parts of San Francisco… From there, we made our way back towards the Vieux Port. The walk revealed another facet of Marseille – the fact that it’s a very cosmopolitan place indeed. At times, the street scene was more reminiscent of Egypt or Tunisia, than France (kind of reminded us of Palermo, actually).

We eventually ended up in the Panier district, which is kind of the old town of Marseilles. Originally this remarkably charming part of town, with its sloped cobble-stone streets (the Panier is kind of located on a hilltop overlooking the old port), was inhabited by the poor folks of Marseilles. Quite surprisingly, it has managed to retain some of its original character – rather than becoming a tourist trap. After a quick pizza for dinner, we made our way back to the hotel, and prepared ourselves for the night’s entertainment.

…which was, theatre! The play I had chosen was called “Paris-Marseille” – it was a touching story about a Parisian teacher who is sent to teach in Marseilles, and has to share a flat with a, how shall I put it, rather typical Marseilles bloke. What followed was 2 hours of “humiliate the Parisian the Marseilles way” – no clichés spared! It was all rather entertaining, in spite of the fact that I only understood about one word in three the Marseilles guy said (he laid on the accent “a bit”) – thankfully the humor wasn’t what I would call subtle… ;-)

We started the next day with a bit of shopping, and then decided to explore the area around the port a bit more. We ended up in the Abbey of St. Victor – which is one of the oldest churches in Europe (dating back all the way to 415). It’s a really fascinating place to visit – basically the basilica that is today visible (dating back to 1200) is built on top of the old monastery, which is now the crypt. So basically, after visiting the “modern church”, you can walk downstairs into the crypt, and admire the remains of one of the oldest places of worship in Europe. Fascinating stuff!

In the afternoon, we headed to L’Estaque, a small fishing village, located at the outskirts of Marseille. In the olden days, it was a popular hideout for impressionist artists, notably Paul Cezanne, who painted quite a few of his paintings here. L’Estaque is not, as one might think (considering its popularity with painters), a picture-perfect cute little fishing port, assailed by hordes of tourists. It’s got quite a gritty and every-day feel to it, and certainly hasn’t been overrun by tourists. There are certainly a fair few restaurants here, but they mostly seem to serve locals. We basically really liked the place & its rugged charm.

After a swim in the ‘Med to wash off the sweat we’d acquired in the summer heat, it was time to hit the road and head back home. A very nice mini-break indeed!

Bouillabaisse time!

I’ve been doing a bit of a side job as a real-estate agent, as my auntie Tutta decided to move into our friends Anne’s and Pete’s apartment in les Hauts de Vaugrenier. Finally, a few days ago, Tutta arrived and moved in.

What was remaining was for me to hand over her keys – so my parents came over with Tutta for this very purpose. The “pick-up-the-keys” turned into an aperitif, and before we knew it, we’d agreed to go out to dinner. Quite appropriate, I suppose, a bit of a “welcome dinner” for Tutta, and a “farewell dinner” for the fold, who were heading back to Finland for a month.

After some deliberation, we decided upon a real Cagnes-sur-Mer institution, the Charlot 1er, located on the seaside at Cros-de-Cagnes (the fishing port of Cagnes, where I used to do sailing). Charlot 1er specializes, appropriately given its location, in seafood. Since we saw Bouillabaisse on the menu, the choice was not hard – just had to go for that (the last one I had in Marseillle really made a good impression on me).

The bouillabaisse we had here was perhaps a little bit less impressive (this is after all not the Vieux port of Marseille), but still one of the best meals I’ve had recently. And the wine we had with it was nothing to frown at either. All in all, we had a very pleasent evening indeed. Good food, good drink, good company, what else can one hope for ? And we got those keys delivered as well ;-).

From the stars of the Croisette to the fishermen of Marseille

Barely had we seen off the last visitors, when new ones where already here. This time it was the turn of my brother Janne and his girlfriend Katja to grace the Cote d’Azur with their presence. They were planning to do a bit of inter-railing, and started their journey here.

It so happens that the Cannes film festival was on as well, so a visit to gliz and glamour of the Croisette naturally imposed... Mathilde had managed to acquire some tickets to the Quinzaine des Realisateurs – the Director’s fortnight. It’s a bit less glamorous than the official selection, although it is also frequented by the odd celebrity (last year, Francis Ford Coppola presented his latest movie there, and this year Mick Jagger paid a visit). We opted for a Danish movie called Alting bliver godt igen (Everything Will Be Fine). Before the movie, we had a nice sandwich, enjoying the sunshine on the beach. The movie itself was pretty good, with a plot very similar to Scorsese’s Shutter Island, actually. But in a bit more everyday format. An entertaining one and a half hours, all in all. After the movie, we had to rush back to the train station to catch our train, so no time for celebrity-spotting, then…

On Wednesday, my brother and Katja were heading towards Provence, from where they were planning to carry on to Barcelona. So I decided to join them for the day to Marseille, which is conveniently on the way. The plan (rather ambitious, considering that 4 members of my family were involved ;-) was to leave from my flat at 9 o’clock. In the end, we left Cagnes at 9:30, pretty good going actually. Thankfully, the grey skies of the Alpes Maritimes turned to blue skies and sunshine by the time we arrived in Marseille.

Having parked, we made our way to the old port, which is naturally the focal point of Marseille. The plan was to have lunch, and then head for a boat trip to the Calanques. Keen to tick off yet another tourist cliché/must-do-experience, we decided to go for a Bouillabaisse, a true Marseilles culinary institution. Since we were in a bit of a hurry to catch our tour, we ended up having our Bouillabaisse in the 1st place serving it we found on the port. It was quite a chic place, and the prices were, shall we say, rather heavy on the wallet. But, we didn’t complain, since I think we were really treated to the real thing. Bouillabaisse is a kind of fish soup made of various fishes and shellfish, with plenty of spices. What makes it different from normal fish soup is the fact that it’s kind of served in two parts. First, you have the broth (without the fish meat) together with bread croutons, garlic and mayonnaise. And then you have the fish meat with potatoes and vegetables. It’s a veritable feast that I can whole-heartedly recommend to anybody. And a very filling meal as well – none of us even fancied a dessert…

Having filled our stomachs, it was time to visit “hit the sea”. Our boat tour took us out of the old port (giving us very nice views over the old port and of Notre-Dame-de-la-Garde, the famous church overlooking the port), past the equally reputable Chateau d’If (it is a prison fortress located on an island, made famous by Alexander Dumas’ The Count of Monte Christo). From there, we headed west towards Cassis, to discover the famous Calanques. The word Calanque has its origins in Corsican, and means inlet. Basically the calanques are a series of bays dotting the coastline between Marseille and Cassis, overlooked by some imposing cliffs. Our tour took in 12 in total, of very differing shapes and sizes. Some of them house very picturesque beaches, others house cozy looking restaurants. The last one in fact houses the pleasure port of Cassis.

All in all, it made for a very nice couple of hours on the boat, especially since the weather was perfect for this kind of trip. Although, it has to be said, the waves were quite menacing going back to Marseille. Good thing none of us were prone to sea-sickness. I did see a few people “re-decorate” the boat, and quite a few people ending up soaking wet, refusing to leave their prime spots on the deck. But people took it all with good humour.

The way back to Cagnes turned out to be a bit painful. After some all-too hurried goodbyes to Janne and Katja, wishing them luck for their inter-railing adventure, I ran back to the train station to catch my train, and did arrive at the station in time. But alas, for some reason the damn ticketing machine wouldn’t sell me a ticket for that particular train. So I ended up taking the next one, which was in, 2 hours…. Good thing I brought a good book, eh? ;-) Anyway, all in all, it had been a very nice day out with the family.

Afternoon in Marseilles

Aniko and Philippe had decided to go Marseilles this weekend, since Aniko is going back to the UK soon. So we decided to drive down to meet them for the Saturday. So we got up early in the morning, jumped into our Polo, and off we went down the A8, all the way down to Marseilles.













Marseilles is the 2nd-largest city in France, with a spirit and attitude to match. It was founded in the 6th century BC by the Greeks (as Massalia). Marseilles is first and foremost a port, so it was natural to start our visit in the Vieux port (the old port). It was a very lively place indeed, with cyclists (there was some kind of a big event coming up), Argentinean rugby fans (they were playing Georgia that night, if memory serves me) and of course the fishermen selling their catch, in their loud, flamboyant way. It also affords a very nice panorama of the Notre-Dame-de-la-Garde (the famous church looking over the city perched on its hill).



Having visited the Abbey of Saint-Victor (one of the oldest and most important religious sites in France), we headed back down to the port to meet up with Philippe and Aniko. The initial plan was to have a Bouillabaisse, a real Marseilles institution (a kind of soup made of fish, shellfish and veggie), but were a bit put off by the prices (obviously tourism is alive and well in Marseilles, in spite of its somewhat scruffy reputation). So we decided to have Grand Cru Pastis instead (another Marseillais institution) - much better choice I think :-)

After this we walked around the old town (which is called the "Panier"), and of course went up to the famous Notre-Dame-de-la-Garde (taking the tuf-tuf train), from where we had some great views over the city.



A very nice day was rounded off by a great dinner off Cannabis street (or was it Canebière or something like that?) - a great feast of oysters, crayfish and other strange critters (not usually my sort of thing - but hey this was after all Marseilles).