Arrived at ‘Les Amandiers’ campsite just behind L’Ouille beach, around the corner from Collioure. It is not the first time I have stayed in the area – we stayed in a campsite in Argeles-sur-mer ‘en famille’ about ten years ago (with friends Barry and Fiona Edwards). But it is my first time at ‘Les Amandiers’. On arriving the campsite manager said to David in French “I think you have been here before, yes?” “Yes, that’s right,” said David, “in 1976.” The man looked slightly surprised! I guess he was thinking of a more recent Scull visit: David’s parents came here a couple of years ago. David’s love for this part of France runs in the family.

For those of you who don’t know, David’s family spent some time living in France in the 1970’s. David’s father was an aeronautical engineer who worked for Rolls Royce. He was part of the brilliant team who worked on Concorde, first in Toulouse and then in Paris. David spent a year attending a French comprehensive in Toulouse before he transferred to boarding school in the UK. So his rusty French is considerably better than my ‘A’ level rusty French, and whilst I struggle to follow the accent down here, he finds it reassuringly familiar.

It was late afternoon by the time we headed down to L’Ouille, a small cove with an attractive pebbly beach somewhat reminiscent of the Southern coast of Cornwall. It was a windy day and the breakers were surprisingly large, but there were a handful of people swimming.  We went for a bit of an explore of the rocks and tried to follow the lower path to Collioure which David and his family used to take, but it has broken off and fallen into the sea. So we came back to the beach and gathering our courage, plunged into the sea. Bracing! I was quietly amazed to see David swimming, his usually refuses to venture into anything below 26 degrees, but this time he seemed to enjoy it. I’ll get him swimming in the English sea yet!