A dream of Biarritz

I have never been to Biarritz. All I knew of the town as I went to bed last night is that it is a chic seaside resort in the South of France, though whether it lies on the Mediterranean or the Atlantic – I had no idea. I’ve never been to Biarritz, nor, to my best recollection, have I ever read about it in a National Geographic magazine, nor seen any TV programme about it. I have tended to mix up Biarritz with St Tropez – both end with a ‘z’ (except Pink Floyd never sang about Biarritz*).

Yet last night I had the following dream… I was reversing a long, black Citroen Traction Avant into a parking space by the main railway station in Biarritz, amazed at how nimbly it manoeuvred. It was like this one:

Soon, I was walking along a street, heading towards the sea, a map in my hand. The street lay parallel to the coast, there was another parallel street between the one I was on and the beach. The sky was blue, a sea breeze kept me cool; the fences of the houses were white, the grass parched. This was the 1950s, postwar France was getting its act back together.

I stopped by the gate of a house. I knew what I was looking for. I opened the gate, no one around. Just behind the right gatepost (looking at it from within the garden), I knelt down and started digging the dusty dry earth with a small trowel.

Yes, it was here. Almost straight away I came to a cardboard box, under a light scattering of top soil. I pulled it out. A box containing nothing more than some cake decorations and some small toys. I put it to one side, and kept digging with the trowel. I hit something more solid. Another box, smaller in size, made of a harder material… A wooden box… I lifted it out, and prised open the lid with the trowel's blade.

Bingo! Inside was a roll of gold coins – ten or more, wrapped in a cardboard tube. As I cracked the tube open, they gleamed brightly in the sunlight. But I felt that the time was not right. I put them back in the wooden box, replaced the lid, popped it down below the ground, covering it with some soil, then placing the cardboard box with the cake decorations on top, then I covered that with soil, then scattering some more on top to make the surface look undisturbed. I looked round - no one had seen me.

I called Cousin Hoavis to pop over with his car, but his mum picked up the phone and said he’d just had gastric flu or food poisoning. Later I returned to the same spot; the boxes were still there I woke up.

*****

The first thing I did was to check Google Maps. WOW! The map of Biarritz is identical to the one I had had in my hand in my dream – though more complex, with new streets added, more detail over the past six decades. There’s the coast, there’s that parallel road (Rue de Madrid) – and there… YES! Street View filled in the picture. Using it, I can tell you, dear readers, exactly where the boxes were buried IN MY DREAM…

Avenue de la Milady. On the eastern side of the street. Under the post to the left of the white gate (the post behind the woman in the white dress).

*And there, in that song, St Tropez, I find this line: “Diggin' for gold and a hole in my hand" WOW.

Human consciousness is an amazing thing.

UPDATE 26.01.2020. One thing wasn't right - I checked Biarritz station on Google Maps, and it was in the wrong place and didn't 'feel' at all like it did in the dream. On checking the map again, I discovered that there had been another station, in the centre of Biarritz, called Biarritz-Ville. It closed in 1980. Today, the building is still there, although it's now a theatre (Biarritz Midi). THIS is the station I dreamed I was parking the big Citroen in front of. 

UPDATE 12.02.2020. Another interesting online discovery was the presence in Biarritz of the GI University, set up by the US military immediately after the end of the war in Europe; it existed until 1946 and was intended to prepare GIs for life in American universities and adjusting to civilian/student life on their return home. 

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