Yacht show catastrophy

I had just sat down in the sunshine in Antibes for a late lunch after tidying up some vital business for Currencies Direct. I had seen grilled sardines on the menu and had decided on the Chateau Minuty rose, when suddenly I was forcibly dragged from the restaurant so that we could meet some chaps at the Antibes Yacht Show. When I remonstrated, I was placated by the fact that there was a decent restaurant inside the show. This is where it all started to go horribly wrong.

I was dragged to something loosely resembling a restaurant where my choice was clear, a club sandwich or a chicken curry sandwich. I jest not. It seemed to have escaped the notice of the restaurateurs and indeed that nice lady decorator that we were in the exceptionally well-heeled yachting heart of the what is arguably the most renowned culinary region in the world where good food is consumed daily in a specially ring fenced period of two or sometimes three hours when the shops shut and commerce in general grinds to a halt. Lunch is an institution in France in general and Provence in particular and I worship that.

But it got worse, after a wait of some 15 minutes I was told that they had no more chicken curry sandwiches. Clearly the staff were sufficiently mathematically challenged that it took a quarter of an hour from the point of submitting this already disappointing order for them to work that out. So even more deflated and with the smell and taste of freshly grilled sardines still in my nostrils but tantalisingly out of reach, I made my second choice from a frankly severely underwhelming selection, a club sandwich. Still the misery does not end, the club sandwich was off, and so, for my special lunch at the Antibes Yacht Show, the shop window for the sale of yachts of up to £150 million in deepest Provence, the food capital of the world, I had to endure a Croque Monsieur and chips as my picture today captures in all its full horror..

What presentation, what content, a masterpiece, not

My yacht broker, as opposed to yachtbreaker, which is a much more likely description for him given the reputation the naked politician has built for himself over the past two years that I have known him, was there at the show. We had decided, given the forecasts storms from today onwards that yesterday was a better option to make our annual visit.

The naked politician was enjoying his new role as a yacht broker number 9 (sounds like a cue for a song)  for Blue Water Yachting, which  he admitted was the first job that he has had in over 20 years but it was evidently he was still not grown up enough to be allowed to wear long trousers.

There is a local group of some repute called The Yachtbreakers whom I saw at a function some time last year, I wonder if they are related?

With parking at a premium, we had taken the train from Mouans Sartoux to the centre of Antibes for this gastronomic catastrophe. The Yacht show was buzzing. Mainly it may be argued because of the impending deluge and severe weather warning which will apparently engulf the next three days of this event. Most locals had decided that a visit today was in their best interests.

Whilst at the show we encountered the steely eyed beauty that is Lisa Thornton Allan. I don’t know quite how it entered the conversation, or who told us she hates whistling or that hearing whistling makes her violent, but armed with that knowledge perhaps I should have refrained from whistling the tune to The Beauty And The Beast.

Chris France