La Mer

Yesterday was Spikey's birthday and it seemed that in honour of this special day summer had at last decided to arrive.  With this in mind we took a well earned day off from renovating the house and headed for the coast to one of our favourite seaside destinations, Royan, which is about a 45 minute drive from us in Cognac.

When we arrived the temperature was already soaring at an alarming rate but being a bit early for lunch we thought we would kill some time by going for a wander on the beach.  We flung off our shoes with wild abandon in eagerness to feel the glorious sand between our toes but it wasn't long before we were running for the sanctuary of some trees when the soles of our feet started to burn.

Royan is for the most part a post war town architecturally having been the subject of bombings raids during the Second World War by the British and Americans which horrifically included one of the earliest uses of Napalm.  Thought to be the result of a terrible breakdown in communication around 2,700 civilian lives were lost during the campaign of April 1945 and 10,000 residents injured.  

With such a tragic past it's no surprise that Royan's architecture is sometimes considered to be very stark and grey.  The famous Church of Notre Dame was completed in 1958 and illustrates a town looking firmly into the future.

With all this being said the Royan of today has developed into a holiday destination oozing with 50's Hollywood glamour and on a sunny day is a stunning place to visit.  

Having cooled off a bit in the shade we decided to have lunch on the terrace of Le Régent Café situated just across the road from the beach. We had an enjoyable meal of moules marinières (for Spike) and fish en papillote (for me) and although the café is known for it's speciality ice creams we couldn't resist the îles flottantes for dessert.

The postcard below was printed on the back of the menu and showed what the café and surrounding buildings looked like before the war.

After lunch we decided to brave the beach again (keeping our shoes firmly on until we reached the wet sand). We were expecting to have a little paddle before heading off home but the sea was much much warmer than we had anticipated so we enjoyed half an hour of swimming and jumping over some quite scary waves followed by an hour or so drying off in the sun of the almost deserted beach.

Whilst slowly turning pink I passed the time by trying to decide which of the villas that I could see from my blissful horizontal position I would choose if I won Friday's Euromillions.  

Here are some more examples of the remaining Belle Epoque villas in Royan that sit happily (and sometimes not so happily) beside newer builds.   

I couldn't make up my mind... which one would you choose?