The Beach at La Tamarissiere today (photo by Eileen)

I have a very mixed relationship with time spent on the beach.
Had I decided to do the sensible thing and stay in Ireland this would not really have mattered, I gather from the people who still live there that the decision to beach or not to beach is not one that keeps them awake nights.
Unfortunately I have decided to settle in a part of the world which not only has the correct temperatures for La Plage , but is also within a half hour of tens, if not twenties of smooth sandy beaches.
It makes it really difficult to pretend that “a day at the beach” is not an option.
Fortunately for me we are too busy during the height of the summer season for my wife to have the time to break down my beach resistance . Even when she has , the Mediterranean sometimes conspires with me to make the whole experience as unenjoyable as possible.
There was a beautiful July day in 2010, temperatures around 24 C when I rushed with gay abandon into the Mare Nostrum only to scream like a girl as I lost all feeling below the waist. The water was a terrifying 11 C , colder than even in Donegal on Christmas day, this was due , I afterwards discovered, to tidal currents and the fact that heat rises and a lot of stuff which I did for Inter cert science and have forgotten.

About two weeks ago , when the grand-sons were visiting, I was again blackmailed to the beach.
This time I checked the temperature before going on the beach , Air ; 28 C. Water ; 24 C- my kinda temperatures.
There was also a sign up at the life guard station about Medusa so I assumed we were going to be entertained between swims with some of Sophocles plays- my kinda day on the beach.
Unfortunately we were to discover that Meduse was the French word for Jellyfish and the water was thick with little blue and white amoebas which looked like eyeballs which had been torn from their sockets. Furthermore all the lifeguards and all of their girl-friends and putative girl-friends (a large army) were patrolling the waterline shooting in sight anyone who ventured to put a toe in the Med.

We decided to call it a day but were then confronted by yet another reason (and I realise I may be alone in this) why I find these expeditions such a strain.
Two, youngish, Dutch ladies had decided to sunbathe just next to us and, as was their wont, had decided to do this without benefit of any clothing above their waistlines.
Now I am as proficient as the next Christian Brother’s boy from the fifties, at managing to float unconcernedly down a beach avoiding any direct eye contact with Dutch nipples but these ladies did the unforgivable ; without covering their upper quarters they addressed me directly.
“Excuse me Mistair” – said one – “But why are they forbidding the svimming ?”
Believe me it is very difficult to balance three towels, a cool box , a beach Umbrella, and two beach chairs in your hands while you try to think of the English word for Meduse and all the while being aware that your Catholic upbringing doesn’t permit you to lower your sight below the skyline.

This seamlessly brings me in fact to the beautiful month of September we are having at the moment- perfect beach weather in fact.
Furthermore since the French have experienced La Rentree, and have fled back to Paris and the North of France, the beaches have been left to the English, the Germans and the Dutch – and in such comparatively few numbers that you can walk the beach, avoiding nipple contact without risking your life.
An added bonus is that this is the moment that the average portly French man feels he can safely expose himself , making a portly Irishman far less obvious.
Yesterday I was persuaded that , as we had by design no visitors except a sun starved daughter and her even paler boy-friend, I should go to the beach.
At an early hour I began to gather up my Beach Survival Kit.

Eileen’s portrait of her father on the beach.

First a large beach umbrella , I am a sensitive soul and abhor any contact with direct sunlight. Then a comfortable beach chair is essential , not as easy for a large gentleman as you would imagine. Our house is full of the broken remains of beach chairs who failed the gravity test on a Mediterranean beach.
This problem I finally solved in a Vide Grenier by buying two wooden jobs, sort of industrial beach triangles which,even though horribly heavy and akward to carry , when they are imbedded in the sand, and coupled with a beach mat give me a small modicum of comfort and a position from which it is possible to read – this is another essential.
Lying prone, even under a stout umbrella , with absolutely nothing to do is to me the most boring thing in the world. A lot of the people who do lie on the beach do so, I notice, with their eyes closed. Are they asleep ? What in the name of God have they been doing all night to be able to sleep all day like this ?
So therefore that leads to the third item in my Beach Survival Kit- a good book, and, therefore of course, my reading glasses. As I know I will also need my ordinary glasses and my sun glasses this necessitates a small knapsack to carry my optical aids alone.
Next necessity is the swimming togs and with that The Towel.
This Towel has to be a huge bath sheet.
Changing on the beach with anything smaller when you are my size requires the agility of a gymnast, the grace of a ballerina and the lack of modesty of a Chippendale- none of which attributes I possess.
Add to the kit a camera (never used but always brought), some iced water in a cool box and you will imagine my laden progress along the beach.

Yesterday on Serignan Plage a further woe was added to my miseries.
There was a crisp northerly wind blowing on the beach , refreshing the 24C temperatures but making the erection of beach umbrellas impossible. (Ours went straight into the water once erected and it took some time for the man on the next door towel to rescue it)
Therefore, being exposed to the sun my wife decreed that I should be covered with Factor 50- this is a particularly viscous and adherent sun cream.
The minute you are covered with it and the slightest breeze blows you are turned into human sandpaper and every move removes yet another layer of epidermis.

This leads directly to the one mitigating and pleasurable aspect of a day in the beach.
The Swim.
This is (saving jellyfish and arctic currents) nearly pure pleasure.
Wallowing about in warm water gives me a feeling of weightless ness I haven’t experienced since I was 40 , still smoked and weighed in at 12 stone.
I usually stay in far too long and get all white and wrinkled this is partly to enjoy the experience but also the realisation that once decanted from the sea I face again the terrors of The Beach.