The arrival ceremony of the Olympic flame will begin with a gigantic maritime parade, with 1,024 boats registered to escort the Belem in the northern then southern harbors of the Phocaean city, from 11 a.m. to 5 p.m. Then the ship will make its majestic entry into the Old Port at 7 p.m., before docking opposite Canebière, Marseille’s emblematic avenue.
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It is then that the Olympic torch will come down from the ship, with the first bearer on French soil being the 2012 Olympic champion in the 50 meter freestyle, Florent Manaudou, whose sister Laure, Olympic champion and triple medalist in 2004, in Athens, had was the first French bearer in Greece, during the flame lighting ceremony in Olympia.
Then there will be the lighting ceremony of the first Olympic cauldron, on the Quai de la Fraternité, at 7:45 p.m., at the end of a floating pontoon of around a hundred meters in the shape of an athletics track. Will Florent Manaudou be responsible for this mission or will he pass the baton to another personality for this symbolic ignition? The suspense remained total on this point Wednesday morning.
