Dandelion 14

 

Freighters hurry from the docks. Attentively escorted by tugs, bow and stern. To keep them on the straight and narrow, of the walled channel. Which leads from the wharves to the sea.

Making ten or twelve knots, in order to establish rudder authority. Outpacing the joggers and sightseers, who patrol the mole. Heading for the viewing point, at its tip.

The quintessential sail-training school-students, tomorrow's French offshore racing champions, are momentarily shepherded out of harms way, by their RIB borne teachers. As the tugs peel away, and the leviathan returns to her element.

A thoroughly modern city, reconstructed from the ruins left after World War ll, Le Havre looks 'French' only in the abundant provision of promenades and open spaces, in which to take the air.

 Its tree lined boulevards are laid out New York grid iron style. With the, skyscraper-tall, modernist spire, of the Eglise Saint Joseph, dominating the city skyline.