It’s a funny thing: at first, I didn’t really like it here in Saintes Maries de la Mer. It can be seen to be a God-awful, smelly, mosquito-infested town at the end of the universe – all of which is pretty accurate. But there’s something about it that grows on you. Firstly, there’s the fact that it’s much warmer – nay hotter – here: we went from 16 degrees in Chamrousse to 30 degrees here. Very pleasant indeed. On more remote parts of the beach, clothes are merely optional.
Speaking of the beach: I used to think that Sotavento beach in Fuerteventura was big. At some 17km long (their tourist information claims 22km but they’re lying), it was the biggest, most wonderful beach I’ve ever seen. Still is. Fabulous white/golden sand the whole way. But it’s very windy, too – it’s a place I used to do a lot of windsurfing, and the Sotavento sand – like all the sand on Fuerteventura – is very fine. Anything more than a gentle breeze (Force 4 Beaufort) means the sand starts to blow. Frequently, it was blowing force 6, and the sand was streaming across the beach, reaching places where you didn’t know you had places. For soaking-up the sun, it was useless: two minutes after coating yourself in sun-goo and lying down on the towel you’d spent so long nailing into place, you were a sticky sandman. I used to spend endless hours in the evenings trying to dig sand out from my earholes. But we loved it there because it was so wild and so undeveloped.
The beach here stretches some 32km from Saintes Maries de la Mer on le Petit Rhone to Plage de Piémanson, world’s end, at the Eastern end, up against le Grand Rhone. Much of it is fairly inaccessible as there are no roads behind the beach, so it’s only busy close to where traffic can reach. Much of it also falls within a nature reserve, so you’re not supposed to leave the dyke (useable by walkers and cyclists) that runs inland of 14km of the beach to access the beach, except at certain allowed points. And then, it’s another 5km of cycling (on very flat paths/dykes, it has to be said) from the main dyke to the beach.
Like Fuerte, the sand here is very fine. Like Fuerte, the wind here can blow pretty hard. It did exactly that for the first two days we were here whilst staying in the campsite. Just like in Fuerte, we were digging sand out of places it didn’t ought to go, and the van has taken on a very gritty feel to it. Every surface is coated in sand and dust. It doesn’t matter how much housekeeping we do, just opening a window brings in more dust (and mozzies).
The famous Mistral wind blows all the way down the Rhone valley from the mountains, exiting land over the Camargue. It’s a cold, Northerly wind and is usually very strong, and very predictable in strength and frequency of occurrence.
There’s a particular branch of windsurfing that’s all about speed, and breaking world speed records. It demands vey specialized equipment, a lot of patience (for when the predictable winds fail to blow), and very, very specialized locations. In order for a speed to be ratified as a record, it must be measured over a (minimum) 500m course in the presence of official observers. The course must be wave-free. Waves slow down windsurf boards so locations without waves must be chosen for speed record attempts. Sotavento is used every year despite being coastal: The course is set within 2 metres of the beach so the offshore wind has no chance of creating waves in that space. Of course, the ocean-generated waves still come in towards the shore so it’s far from ideal, and the whole circus is more of a publicity/financial affair. Ideally, the course should be set at 120 degrees to the wind: that’s the angle that most craft can attain the maximum speeds. Sotavento beach is pretty close to that 120 degrees, purely by chance.
Back in the 1990’s, some famous windsurfer noticed the reliable winds here in the Camargue and decided it would be a good place to build a purpose-built speed course. Permission was duly obtained, and a 1km long ditch, 20 m wide, 120 degrees off the typical Mistral wind direction, was built on the beach just to the East of Saintes Maries de la Mer (the “Canal”). Every year, the windsurfing speed tour would come here and – most years – records were broken; the last ones here being in 2005.
Things come and go. The cost of upkeep of the canal at Sts Maries was high, the wind failed to blow for a few successive years, and other, better locations were found (in Namibia). The “canal vitesse du surf” has not been used for many years now, but it’s still here. Forlorn, slowly filling-in with sand and salt, it’s now the province of gulls, little egrets, herons, fish, dog walkers and mosquitoes. I really wouldn’t want to let any part of my body come into contact with the water remaining in there. But it’s a piece of windsurfing history, and I walked the length of it just for pleasure of being there. If you’re interested, you can still see it on Google Earth. It shows quite clearly as a dark, straight line, between the dyke and the sea, about 3km to the East of the town. Apparently, it does fill up with water when Autumnal storms coincide with spring tides.
The Camargue is all marsh. They (the French) like to call them “étangs”. Alistair Mclean once wrote a book (one of his very early novels) called “Caravan to Vaccarès”. Well, Vaccarès is the biggest étang in the Camargue. But actually it’s all marsh. In the summer, most of these étangs dry out, leaving a crusty layer of shimmering salt. And mud. Lots of slimy, smelly mud. And innumerable flamingos. But besides this, we see herons, little egrets, oystercatchers, curlews and more varieties of gulls than I knew existed.
I may have mentioned the beaches? Today, we cycled 14km along the dyke to the Phare de la Gochelle (Phare = Lighthouse). We then took another dyke S to the beach. There were a dozen or so cars or camper vans parked adjacent to the beach. As the sand near the top of the beach was very dry and had a salty crust on it (obviously no tides have been up here for many months), it made for easy cycling. Less than 1km along, and the whole beach was ours. One couple about 300m to one side of us and that was it. And it wasn’t windy, and the sand wasn’t blowing. It wasn’t too hot (26 degrees, apparently) and there wasn’t a cloud to sully the sky.
You may have heard of the Camargue horses? I don’t know the history, but the Camargue is very tied-up with horses through its history. White horses, they are. Many of them roam freely over the marshy land. Many more of them are available to rent by the hour.
Yesterday, we were on a not-quite-so-remote-piece-of-beach-as-we-were-on-today. At around 6pm, some five or six horses were brought along the beach at a fair old gallop by their riders (all young girls), who decided to them take them into the sea right beside us. They were clearly used to the sea, and had a rare old time pawing at it, cantering through it, galloping along the beach beside it for the sake of one of the girls recording it on her iPad, and generally getting thoroughly wet. Great to watch such accomplished riders on such fearless horses.
I really think I like this place.