Marseille is not a city that reveals itself politely. Give it a full day, start at the water, and let the hills do the rest. Almost everything below is walkable, with one tram ride and one boat.
6:30 to 8:00 — the Vieux-Port wakes up
Be on the Quai des Belges at first light. Fishermen sell the night catch straight off the boats on the quay each morning, in crates, in Provençal, at speed, and it is over long before the tourist cafés open. Stand and watch. Then walk under the Ombrière, Norman Foster mirrored canopy from 2013, and look up.
8:00 to 9:00 — coffee and a navette
The navette is Marseille own biscuit, a hard little boat-shaped thing scented with orange blossom, baked in the city since the late eighteenth century. It is designed for dunking, which tells you what to order alongside it.
9:00 to 11:00 — Le Panier
Climb into the oldest quarter, a knot of stepped lanes, ochre and pink facades, washing strung between shutters and murals on every second wall. At its centre sits La Vieille Charité, Pierre Puget seventeenth-century almshouse with its domed chapel and triple arcades, now housing the Mediterranean archaeology collection.
