Day three we woke up bright and early to take a boat to the Calanques (narrow coves with steep cliff walls) east of Marseille near Cassis. Along the way we passed a few interesting sites, and most importantly we were out on the water where we kept nice and cool.
The sites proved to be beautiful and when we arrived at our last Calanque, we got to do a little swimming which was quite refreshing.
When we got back to the old port, we decided to explore a bit to find a Mansion we had passed in the boat. The mansion turned out to be a "summer home" Napoleon had built for himself but never ended up using. Today it's used as a venue for meetings and ??? -- the translation was really really bad, so it's hard to say exactly.
After a bit of walking, sweating, and pausing (it was still extremely hot), we finally got up to the mansion. It had stunning views of the Port, the islands off Marseille, and was itself a site to see up close.
Once we were satisfied that we'd seen enough, we set off to see another fort in the area. Unfortunately we followed some signs to a dead end, and on our way to continue our search we passed a bus stop that would have taken us, and subsequently did take us, directly to the beach...It seemed like a no brainer at the time, and we cooled off a bit in the water. Like I said before -- forts are the worst tourist attraction.
Anyway the beach was the cherry on top of a great day.
