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Harbouring secrets and quarries
From the sea, Carry looks like a concrete town. Draw nearer and you discover a resort with a long history and the charming atmosphere of the Belle Époque. And a few well-kept secrets...
Following the coast looking for Carry le Rouet, the railway viaduct soaring out of the rocky cove, or “calanque”, is hard to rely on if you don’t know the number of arches off by heart. It’s just as complicated trying to take your bearings from the plush (a word as inadequate as the view is superb) villas cascading all along this rugged coast. 
However, the indecisive sailor will find their eye helplessly drawn to the main, unattractive landmark; a block of flats fifteen stories high dominating the northern end of the harbour. Although it’s not so pleasing to the eye, it’s as incongruous and visible as the block of stone which falls from the sky at the beginning of 2001: A Space Odyssey. This is the kind of building you just have to live in – so that you can’t see it! But you can trust it, so full steam ahead, Carry’s that way.
You suddenly get the impression that you’re sailing towards a big town. Actually, the village is quite small: of the thousand or so hectares covered by the district, only just over a quarter is built upon. The rest is a wooded nature reserve. So maybe putting the whole population in one building isn’t such a bad idea after all...
There’s another reserve under your hull: 85ha of coastal maritime domain, where all fishing is banned in order to protect the marine ecosystems (visit these with a diving club).
FERNANDEL’S HIDEAWAY
You approach via the two sea walls protecting the harbour. Near the entrance, it’s best not to cling to the west coast, which is full of shallows. Don’t go any closer, but have a look. This is where l’Oustaou de la Mar is, Carry’s most interesting and most secret villa: the comedy star Fernandel’s house.
Having chosen Carry le Rouet as a holiday location in the 1930s, the actor had this large house built, which he used as his summer quarters. He used to go fishing from his boat, Caméra, and, according to local stories, used to play petanque and drin
k pastis with his friends from the village. That’s how Fernand Joseph Désiré Contandin, known as Fernandel, contributed to this little resort’s reputation.
The successive owners haven’t wanted the location of l’Oustaou de la Mar to be known. We can tell you, however, that it is the yellow building with three arches and a square tower on the right – the fourth one before the sea wall as you come in from the sea, above a little beach where a small boat can be hauled up, protected by a tiny sea wall. The information has been public since it was put up for sale on the internet last March. But, seeing as the villa isn’t open to visitors in any case, keep this information to yourself.
THE MOORING NEXT TO THE QUARRY
Looking at the landscape surrounding Carry’s harbour, just think to yourself that, long before the comedy star from Marseilles carved out a career for himself, other people lived here in the secret shelters which were well-hidden among the rocks. They were nomads, who lived here around 20,000 years ago, during the last ice age. Much later, others put the place to use for building (of sumptuous villas?) instead of hiding themselves here: they were the Romans, who named the place In carus positio, which means “the mooring near the quarry”, giving us the modern name of Carry.
Le Rouet is a neighbouring hamlet slightly further to the east, in a little bay closed in by the Cap de la Vierge, where a lookout helped watch over Marseilles for a long time. Fires were used to warn the Marseilles lookout, on the site of Notre-Dame de la Garde church, of ships approaching from the Gulf of Fos.
Customs officers set up there in the 18th century and the Empire confirmed Carry’s position as a link in the chain of defences around Marseilles harbour with the establishment of a battery designed to combat attacks by elite English troops.
Another point of interest, which used to be a marker before it was hidden by the seafront casino, is the château built by the local landowners, the lords of Jarente, in the 16th century. Today, this is the Villa Arena hotel, a beautiful Belle Époque building, which can be seen from the harbour, running parallel to avenue Aristide Briand.
It was at the start of the 20th century that Carry’s golden age began. In 1915, the opening of the Miramas-Marseilles railway line, the “little Côte Bleue train”, made this the Marseillais’ favourite seaside resort.
The first housing estates appeared before the war in 1940, along with the arrival of water and electricity. The settlement, which had been a little village of around thirty fishermens’ and poor farmers’ homes, grew to 700 inhabitants that year. Today, there are 6,117 – three times more in the summer.
