The 10th anniversary is about now or has just passed. Look at the pretty bay of Villefranche-sur-Mer, just east of Nice, and imagine an idyllic day in 2004.
Friends had invited us on to their boat. We dropped anchor in the bay - it's a bit like spot the ball but I could show you roughly where - and their son took some photos. One of them, when seen much later, unexpectedly caught a mobile phone on its way out of the pocket of my shorts. Unseen, it continued its journey and ended up at the bottom of the sea.
The young photographer remembered afterwards that he'd heard a small plop. He thought nothing of it. Something small falling off the boat, maybe. As indeed had been the case.
I wondered later how to break the news to The Daily Telegraph that this minor possession of its services department had met a sorry end. In the end, I am fairly sure though memory can be tricky, I told the truth. At least it would have given them a laugh, I thought. Whatever other considerations occurred, they accepted the explanation and simply replaced the phone.
We stayed in Villefranche at the weekend. It is a beautiful little resort, favoured by a handful of stars, and has a pleasant harbourfront with the usual mixture of restaurants good and bad (we ate at one of each during our stay).
Oddly enough, the anniversary was not on everyone's lips. There was no raise-the-Titanic sort of project to locate what must by now be buried treasure. Who knows what now lies above the remains of that Vodafone or Nokia? Or who tried to reach me on it unaware they were calling the seabed?
Another thing has gone astray: a print of the photo our friend's son took. I swear it is here somewhere and will post it should it turn up.
Day two of the trip along the posher bits of the Côte d'Azur took us to St Jean Cap Ferrat. La Pacha, on the port, was the place that attracted our attention with its menu du jour or small lobster, ratatouille and chips preceded by an excellent amuse-gueule of delicate sardine paste and followed by a sorbet. With a pichet of acceptable rosé, it came to 52 euros, which seemed right for the perfect balance of the meal - and half as much as the unappealing bouillabaisse of the night before in Villefranche.
Just before lunch, we bumped into Frédéric Pont at his Continental Art fair gallery. You see him below with some of the displayed works, paintings and sculptures.
All fascinating objects of art, some of it crying out to be bought, all of it beyond budget. But Frédéric was happy to talk about his artists and sculptors, happy times he'd spent in Paris and London and a forthcoming exhibition in Monaco of the gifted Anna Chromy's sculptures.
It is still earlyish days for his gallery but there seems to be plenty of money around in St Jean Cap Ferrat, so he shouldn't starve.
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