You board at quai Gabriel Péri. The Rose des Vents 2 has been tied up here for over thirty years, moored opposite the Barbarac ice-cream parlour. That kind of consistency says something.
The boat slips out of the port and the village immediately rearranges itself. La Ponche, seen from the water, is something else entirely: the fishermen's houses stacked tight against each other, pink, ochre, salmon, the facades dropping almost straight into the sea. Behind them, the walls of the 16th-century Citadelle rise with a weight you never quite feel from the path on land.
Christophe, Tropezien to his bones, keeps up a running commentary. Dry wit, well-timed anecdotes. He takes you from Heraclea, the Greek colony, all the way through to the filming of Et Dieu Créa la Femme and Le Gendarme de Saint-Tropez, then swings the mic toward the billionaires' villas buried in pine and electric gates along the baie des Canebiers. He knows where the money hides.
The marine cemetery, floating between sky and foam on the hillside, stops you for a moment. You won't see it from that angle any other way.
No physical effort required. You sit, you look, you listen. Bring sunscreen; the sun off the water is stronger than it looks. Runs April through October, departing the old port.
