From 11 a.m. to 5 p.m.: large maritime parade, with 1,024 boats which will escort the Belem (and therefore the Olympic flame) in the northern and then southern harbors of Marseille.
19 hours : entry into the Old Port then descent of the flame onto the Canebière. Florent Manaudou, Olympic champion in the 50-meter freestyle in London in 2012 (and present this summer in Paris), will be the first torchbearer on French soil.
7:45 p.m.: lighting ceremony of the first Olympic cauldron, on the Quai de la Fraternité, at the end of a floating pontoon of around a hundred meters in the shape of an athletics track. We do not yet know if it is the brother of Laure Manaudou (first French bearer of the flame this year, but in Greece) or a surprise guest who will take care of it.
Please note that the Olympic flame arrived this morning near Marseille. As I write to you, it is located off the coast of the harbor, beyond the Frioul islands and the Planier lighthouse. The sea is beautiful and the sky as pretty as anything. The symbol of the Olympic Games waits aboard the Belem, the famous three-masted ship which carried it across the Mediterranean for twelve days, coming from Greece.