Late-night socialising at the Sube Hotel: the après, as they say, is at least fifty per cent of what makes Saint-Tropez such a great event. And even this late in the season the nights are warm, further aided by the well-protected harbour entrance facing west and trapping the late afternoon sun. Here you overlook the boats tied stern-to the quay… and inevitably bump into someone you know
accompanied by broaching and explosions like cannon shots as their quickly deployed spinnakers and asymmetrics burst in time to the katabatic gusts of the mistral. Later I felt concerned as the less-experi-
enced crews practised their Mediterranean mooring techniques in 35kt of wind. There was a great deal of the gunning of engines in the tideless harbour at Saint-Tropez, and the deeply unsatisfactory crunch of wooden hull against concrete quay. Throwing a warp and winching yourself in quietly is clearly an alien concept to many down here. To the spectacular sound of Gallic remon- strations and bursting fenders, the sea-sod- den crews made up stern-to anyhow. This is not the Nioulargue, I kept telling
myself in 1999. And yet of course it was. Because, although it was now called Les Voiles and was ostensibly very different from the infamous and quite chaotic yearly Nioulargue gathering, it still embodied the spirit and magnificent display of classic, maxi and modern yachts that made that event famous throughout the world – par- ticularly the classic yacht world. And in 2023 this is a gathering that still
does epitomise classic yacht racing. The boats, especially the big ones, lying stern- to in harbour or flying an acreage of canvas in the trippy swell of the bay, are so gorgeous that people literally stop in their tracks as they arrive at the quay and see them for the first time. Barefoot liveried crews pad the satin- soft-feeling teak decks, brass rag or drinks
50 SEAHORSE
tray in hand, while owners relive the pre- Corinthian days of a glorious past. It is an intoxicating cocktail for the rich owners and onlookers alike, and it’s all in colour. It recalls an almost heraldic past, where
the sheer beauty of the marine architecture and the money that it takes to find a big classic from the golden era and rebuild it in this condition could make you gasp. Back then owners were falling over themselves to find a Fife, a Mylne, Nicholson or Alden to rebuild as new, and join the genteel party with its hard-nosed racing edge. And the best of it was you didn’t have to pay VAT on an old boat. One of the great things about St-
Tropez’s annual spectacle, stretching back into Nioulargue days, is that so much is put on by the organisers for the crews. Sardine suppers out on the mole are accompanied by limitless gallons of local rosé from what used to be called the wine lake of France; the next night it would be beer in the old harbour; boules in the town square… and on it went. The French are very good at events like
this. Their ports are municipal rather than run by private companies and so the mayor – whose personal power makes most British mayors look like a knob of butter where a thin strip of the gold foil has been left round the top – gets to clear his harbour and welcome the boats. Several years ago, having made little or
no progress in my quest to find out more information on this bigger-picture aspect
of the event’s organisation, I was lucky one evening to wander into a quiet corner of town and run into some leading members of the local chamber of commerce. There I finally learned all about how the
week is run. In essence, local businessmen and women help to put on and victual the event so that while boats paid a nominal fee their owners could see that they get this back within the first day or so. Of course, if you are getting stuff for
free you then spend quite freely as well. The canny French told me they called the event their ‘winteriser’, and said it more than doubled the town’s high-season takings. The editor recently shared with me a story of an early Nioulargue in the 1980s, when the legendary Café de Paris, on the main quay and the unofficial HQ for many competing crews, shut its doors two days before the regatta ended. Asked about this, the proprietor, Gallic to his core, explained how ‘we have taken too much money already to see us through the winter… and now we need to rest.’ That said, this year several classic owners
did share with me concerns that Les Voiles is starting to become too expensive. It is still a popular event with British
crews and owners and has been since the 1980s when the first cheap flights to Nice made it an attractive week at summer’s end, especially if you had a crew house to go to or were OK to sleep aboard. And of course most of the boats here are British, from the grand era of late Victorian and
DAN HOUSTON
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