Aaaah France

I have to say I am in love with France. Four glorious days in Brittany. The people are amazingly freindly, the weather was perfect and of course as always the food spectacular. I even drank wine and did not break out in hives so it was a really nice trip. The regional wine is Muscadel, a little drier than I actually like, but a very nice hint of sweetness to it. I even had a glass of red wine our last night in France and it was really good, very smooth and not bitter at all. Can't remember the name of it though.

First, a little history of Brittany, it encompases a rather large area of France, that is made up of 6 what I would call counties (no idea what the french call them). The Northern Finistre, Southern Finistre, Cotes D'Amor, Ille-et-Vilaine, Morbihan and the Loire Atlantique. It does not seem to take more the 2 hours to get to anywhere in the region. Called Brittany or Petit Britagne because "Amorica" (the Roman name for the area), was mostly taken over and settled by Celts from Gran Britagne or the Island of Great Britan, during the 6th Century so like 500AD. From then until the 10th century it was known as Britannia and was a seperate country from Frankish Gaul (the rest of France). In 103 John Lackland of England murdered the son of the current ruler of Brittany and it fell under the rule of the English King. Then the daughter or sister of who would be ruler of Brittany (Alix) married a French prince, Pierre de Dreux and Brittany became a royal fiefdom. In 1297 Philip the Fair, King of the Franks made Brittany ad vassal-duchy and the ducal government reigned as such until Anne the last dukes daughter was forced to marry Charles VIII king of France on December 6 1491. After he died she married the next king Louis XII and so was twice Queen of France. She managed to protect her Duchy as queen but it was still incorporated into the Country of France. That's the brief ancient history of the region.

Ok, so on to the trip itself. I give you an overview of the trip and then the pictures will have the really detailed descriptions of what things were! And of course you know me it will be way more than anyone really wants to know about these places and the things we saw. We only saw a minuet amount of what there is to see and do in the region and a true trip should take 2-3 weeks. Of course, just means we need to go back.

We managed to spend only 22.00 euro round trip for both tickets. Ya gotta love when Ryanair runs the no cost specials, all you end up paying is taxes and of course the checked bag fee.

We landed first in Nantes, had a lovely room in a B&B that looked out at the Ducal palace. Strolled over to the Cathedral and then through the old town. Nantes old town was very lively there were tons of people out strolling, shopping and having drinks or coffees at the sidewalk cafes. Nantes is in the Loire Atlantique region it was the capitol of the Dukes of Brittany and is the largest city in Western France and is the capital of the Pays de la Loire. The reason to visit Nantes is the old town, containing the Cathedral, the Ducal Palace and the Pasage Pommeraye shopping mall in the old town. You could do Nantes in one day, which is what we did and that was plenty, we even got to attend mass in the cathedral which was lovely, even if we could not understand it. There is also a Jules Verne museum in Nantes unfortunately it was not open when we were there. After mass and visiting the Ducal Palace on Sunday, we drove to Rennes.

Rennes a place that you don't need more than a day at in my opinion. It may be because it was Sunday, it may be because the tourist season was over, but Rennes just did not have the energy and feel that Nantes did for me. Part of the problem may lie in the fact that over 90% of the city was destroyed during the liberation in WWII. We did a street by street walk in the old town and there was a run going on so many of the streets were shut down. The only building we got to go in was the Cathedral. There were many very lovely old buildings in Rennes historic quarter that were spared or reproduced after the was as you will see from the picture. We spent the night in Rennes and Monday morning got up with no hotel planned for the night to see where we got during the day.

From Rennes we drove through the Ille and up to Mont St. Michel, if you never see anything else in this area a visit to the Mont is a must. We arrived at about 10:00am and spend the next 5 hours exploring the Mont. Today the Mont is technically in Normandy because the course of the River changed its flow, but tradittionally the Mont is part of Brittany. The Mont was originally known as Mont-Tombe, and a small "oratory" was built there in the 8the century. The abbey was begun in the 10th century and by the 16th doublde the height of the Mont. The main street in the village running up to the abbey is of course very touristy, but it makes arrival and touring of the abbey that much more enjoyable. Our guide in the Abbey told us that in the summer months 4.5 million people come to the Mont and about half of that comes up to tour the abbey. Our hotelier in St. Malo told us that in June and July, the abbey closes early then opens back up from 7-9pm for special evening tours that include traditional or classical music and the abbey is lit with candles. Something we would definately like to do given the opportunity. After having a very nice lunch in one of the restaurants on the village street we headed off, made a breif stop - drive through of Pleugenec, the village our cousin Monique is from. Very pretty village - but then all of Brittany was very pretty in my mind. Stopped in Dinan and walked around a bit, again, very quiet when we were there and even though it was Monday afternoon around 4pm, many of the shops were closed. Met a very nice shopkeeper though on the square who let me use his phone to book a room in Cancale for the night. Drove on to Cancale, supposed to be the best oysters anywhere. Adrian said its true and he had 12 as his starter for dinner. Our room looked out over the ocean which in theory was nice, but it was very busy and we were at the end of the port so at 5:30am when it was time to pull in oysters from the beds it got very noisy. Still beautiful though. After a lovely breakfast we headed out for the day.

Saint Malo, we drove straight through to here and arrived at approximatley 11am. One day is not nearly enough for this my favorite of all the places we saw. I would suggest spending 3 days here and driving to Mont Saint Michel from here as a day trip. Saint Malo was a monk from Wales his name was Mac Low. At the end of the 17th century it was Frances most important port. Again during the liberation of WWII much of this beautiful city was bombed. The government was really smart and some of the historical sites that had been destroyed were recreated exactly sometimes even using the same stones they were originally built with. The feel is then of a very old walled city. After checking in to Elizabeth Hotel, just inside the walls of the city. We took a walk along the walls, the views are beautiful and spectacular. I loved the feel of the city and the fact that you could walk around all the walls in just a couple of short hours. We had lunch at a restaurant right across from the Citadel - my first meal of the amazing mussels and chips lunch that is very popular in the region. Yum Yum is all I can say. Then took a tour through the Musee du Britagne. Small and very quaint, more info to follow on the pictures. Wandered around some of the old areas visited the cathedral and the church of St. Malo, then had a lovely dinner back by the Citadel. Saint Malo is known as the Corsair, city because most of its fame and wealth came from privateers i.e. Pirates. It boasts several famous sons one of which was the discoverer of Canada and the St. Laurence river. Jacques Cartier. They made on of their pirates Robert Surcouf a hero because he destroyed a large english ship during one of the attacks on the city. Wednesday morning we got up and headed back to Nantes via some lovely places.

First stop Paimpont where we had a quick lunch and then through the forest of Paimpont to try and find Merlin's tomb. We weren't very successful, nor did we actually see the "fountain of britagne" a fountain of youth. We were a little dissapointed because we were both surprised to find that there were links with the Arthurian legends and the knights of the round table in France at all. It was an area of history we were both lacking in and will require further study. After our drive through the forest we headed off to Carnac and all the standing stones in the area. That was an amazing sight to see. By this time it was 5:00 and time to head toward the Nantes airport for our final night as our flight left first thing Thursday morning.

I would really like to make another trip or two to this region as there is still so much we did not see and I was very sad to leave.

Hope you enjoy all the photos Adrian took!
http://www.flickr.com/photos/12938045@N02/