Cap d'Antibes - the Garoupe beach and others around
the Cap d'Antibes
Just imagine surveying this view towards
Nice at Easter
The Cap d'Antibes is
the West end of Antibes.
Property there is very
expensive and exclusive - many places there have security gates etc
etc and most property owners do not bother to rent out their houses.
The Garoupe beach on the Cap d'Antibes is very posh! It is
sheltered from the wind and it faces east, so you are not looking
into the sun, except at sunrise for your 6.30am dip in August. Just
imagine waking up to this! If you want to do so on your holiday then
the
webmaster@antibes.co.uk knows of good places to stay!
Plage Joseph on Plage de la Garoupe is really good fun for children in the
Summer and the Petit Plage has shallow warm water and interesting rocks to play around.
The beach is divided into sections, two of which are public non-paying. But the others are good value and an enormous amount of work goes into cleaning away the incredible amounts of seaweed that accumulate over the winters and keeping it clean during the season.
At the end of the beach is Plage Joseph with the yellow Keller beach next door. Lots of people go there, especially people wanting to see people who want to be seen. Quieter La Joliette is in the middle with two sandy public sections each side. The people there are very nice, friendly and jolly. At the end of the main part is Le Rocher, which for food is my favourite with Monsieur Crampe's Crepes. Just around the corner is Petite Plage which is my favourite place to swim and has the best value mattresses and parasols as well. Slightly up the hill is the smartest place of all, the Garoupe Beach Restaurant
If you are coming to the Riviera on your boat or yacht, anchor in the bay and ring up any of these restaurants and they will collect you.
(Taken at Easter 2001)
Plage Keller serves food and is associated
with Cesar's Restaurant. They also do evening events, parties and wedding celebrations.
This is the public section in the middle
Everyone knows everyone there because it is small and it has a
very "village" atmosphere. A lot of people meet for lunch at one of
the restaurant places.
You can walk up and down and swim across all of the privately
operated beach chaise/ umbrella/ food places and no-one minds.
The yacht owners anchor in the bay and telephone the restaurants to bring them onto the beach
or the rocky coves for the day.
The car park has a greater concentration of Mercs and Rolls Royces
than you've ever seen before and there will be bronzed Italian ladies
there who have been browning themselves every day at the same places
since June.
But the Garoupe beach is one of the only places on the French Riviera with real sand to be enjoyed by children
For holiday accommodation the Cap is probably expensive but
well worth it if you can find it. I might
best describe it in terms of the whole of the
coast having been developed under concrete to a varying degree (especially Nice)
but leaving the Cap still wooded with trees in
which Grasshoppers / Crickets make their characteristic noise. If you
want to rent an apartment or two, the
webmaster knows of local
accommodation or can put you in touch with agents. If you want to buy
a property in the area you
might also email the
webmaster@antibes.co.uk. Whilst there has been development in the Antibes area, adequate infrastructure has been provided so that the town is not affected. This is unlike the whole of the rest of the Cote d'Azur where either new development has been bolted onto existing centres such as at Nice (even the attractive shopping area of Menton is, from time to time, too packed with people) or new concrete jungles have been created such as at Villeneuve Loubet. Through the telescopes at the Church on the Cap you can see it all.
From a path next to the Garoupe beach you can walk around the Headland on a picturesque but very rocky path. There is a notice at the entrance which warns : Longueur du Parcours 2700m. PASSAGES DIFFICILES. ATTENTION! ACCES DANGEREUX PAR COUP DE MER. BE CAREFUL
DANGEROUS PATH BY ROUGH SEA. TEMPS MOYENS 1H.
In fact it is likely to take much longer than one Hour. DO NOT DO THIS WALK IN THE EVENING! There is no path at the
other end (here the path runs out) and you have to clamber over rocks over which
considerable quantities of water splashes.
You end up near
Eilen Roc and the wonderful
rock coast there:
(The above 8 photographs were taken with
a Canon A5 digital camera)
If you want relaxation away from such wildness you can go to the
Eden Roc restaurant you can spend the day
there by the pool there for around 25 pounds per day . . .
On the West side of the Cap, facing Juan and Cannes there is the
Plage des Ondes, beach of waves. Need I say more? There's about 2m of
sand between the wall and the water and hardy souls like it.
But there's a ruined tower in the sea that children like to
play upon. More photos after next summer!
Whilst you're on the Cap, visits to the other beaches of Antibes can make an intersting change
