Hyéres and Port Grimaud

Hyéres is a small town between St Tropez and Toulon which has a history back to the 4th century BC.  It has English connections from the 18th century and Queen Victoria visited in the late 19th century. It was one of the first tourist destinations in the region.
Our timetable included a visit to the market, but we chose to see the old town and the castle on the hill: the Castle of St Bernard.
The 'gate' to the old town.


Inside the gates, the streets are lined with shops spilling out onto the streets.

Knights' Templer tower from the 12th century.  The tower included the church of St Blaise, but is now a museum.

The square around the tower is now filled with restaurants. We climbed up to the top of the tower from where we had great views. The staircase is both steep and narrow.

We continued up the hill to the Church of Saint Paul

 Views from here

Then we continued up to the castle through more narrow and picturesque streets.


The  Chateau d'Hyéres is certainly worth the climb


By now it was time to go down the hill for our journey back to base and lunch.
After lunch, John had us all lined up for the group photo taken on Pat's camera using wifi remote control.

Then we set off for our last visit of the holiday, Port Grimaud.  We travelled along the coast past St Tropez and the homes of the very rich.

Apparently this is the latest craze: Fly board riding, based on jet ski technology.

Port Grimaud is a purpose built resort along the lines of Venice. Each house has it's own parking space, not for a car, but for a boat.  Naturally, this means that it exclusivly for the very rich. As far as we could see, cars take second place, no matter what make they are - anything from a mini to an Aston Martin will be parked round the back.
We took a 20 minute boat tour in 30 seater electric boats.




Then we walked the short distance to the beach

Our driver took the short route back to our hotel where we enjoyed our last evening with the group.