Flower festival - with pirate ship and everything

Continuing the carnival theme - the UK should totally do carnival, you know - today was the combat naval fleuri here in Villefranche. Though I'm not sure I didn't miss something, since I saw no combat, per se... Perhaps it's named after the vicious competition amongst otherwise grown women for flowers on the quayside - honestly, I thought some of them were going to leave bruises as they attempted to grab their share!

Lots of fleurs though - the boats, owned by families that have been in Villefranche for generations - are decked out in bunches and bunches of flowers, which are slowly stripped in the course of the afternoon and thrown at the people watching. My bouquet, since I arrived early enough to be at the front, is clearly fabulous - I left after a while to let the less fortunate people have a chance. I'm just that nice ;-) Also, I feared getting pushed into the sea by those behind me. It looks cold.

So, anyway, flower boat photos: