After 12 days of crossing the Mediterranean from Greece, the Olympic flame arrived off the coast of Marseille on Wednesday morning. She was on board the three-masted Belem.
79 days before the official start of the Paris Olympic Games (July 26-August 11), one hundred years after the last Paris Olympics, the second largest city in France must host the flame and the lighting ceremony of the first Olympic cauldron, around 7:45 p.m., with some 150,000 people expected in the Old Port.
Arrival at 7:00 p.m. in the Old Port
The arrival ceremony of the Olympic flame must begin with a gigantic maritime parade, with 1024 boats registered to escort the Belem in the northern then southern harbors of the Phocaean city, from 11:00 a.m. to 5:00 p.m. The ship is due to make its majestic entry into the Old Port at 7:00 p.m., before docking in front of Canebière, Marseille’s emblematic avenue.
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 50m 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.
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