Porquerolles

Porquerolles (French pronunciation: [pɔʁkəʁɔl]; Occitan: Porcairòlas), also known as the Île de Porquerolles, is an island in the Îles d'Hyères, Var, Provence-Alpes-Côte d'Azur, France.The entire island was purchased in 1912 by François Joseph Fournier, apparently as a wedding present for his wife; he planted 200 hectares (500 acres) of vineyards, which produced a wine that was among the first to be classified as vin des Côtes de Provence.In 1971, the state bought 80 percent of the island to preserve it from development.Porquerolles is the setting for Georges Simenon's novels Le Cercle des Mahé ("The Mahe Circle") (1946) and My Friend Maigret (My Friend Maigret) (1949) and for the 1964 novel Valparaiso[1][2] by Nicolas Freeling.The average annual rainfall is 605.7 mm (23.85 in) with November as the wettest month.