Driving around in Bretagne

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When my 5 week stay in Rochefort was over, I had about 1 week left in France and I wanted to make the most out of it. I was more confident with my grasp of the French language and I realized spending those 5 weeks in Rochefort had been a good idea.

I really wanted to visit St-Malo and Mont St-Michel in Brittany and afterwards go to Caen from where I could visit the beaches of the landings of Normandy.

Before going to St-Malo and Mont St-Michel I went to Brest to visit and old friend of my parents, Jean-Yves Cypres, whose children I had visited in Laval, about a month and a half before.

To get to Brest from Rochefort took several hours, with a combination of 2 trains and a bus. I hadn't seen Jean Yves since we had spent a Christmas with his family in Paris in 1992. But he recognized me straight away when I got off the bus. His English was pretty good and he also spoke some Spanish and with my limited knowledge of French, we made it work between a mix of the three languages.

He lives with his girlfriend Veronique in a house that’s in a place near Brest called Kerallan. He now works as a civilian for a Department of the Navy and is a keen golf player. Veronique is into horses and spends her time taking care of her own horse and other people's horses that she keeps in her stables.

I spent 2 nights at their house and I've got to say that they were extremely nice and surely made me feel at home. The first evening I had dinner with them and they invited one of Veronique's daughters and her husband.

The next day Jean Yves offered to drive me around the southern coast of Brittany and we made a full day of driving, which even though it was rushed, it was good to have a glimpse of that part of France with him as a guide. All stops were very brief, so I don’t have much to work with as far as descriptions of the places go; just some vague first impressions.

We started by leaving from Kerallan at around 9:30, taking the N165 to Quimper and from there taking the D785 to Pointe de Penmarc'h. This was our first stop getting out of the car. There's a nice lighthouse which is worth a look (Phare D’Eckmühl).

All the towns and villages that we drove by or stopped at were similar in construction with clear Breton influences and had invariably a church or cathedral in its center. In the towns sometimes it's possible to see a typical type of construction called "Penty" which are one-story stone houses.

From Pointe de Penmarc'h we took the D785 to Audierne, a nice town which used to be a fishing village and now is mainly a town with nice marinas, a great hotel and good places to eat. We stopped there to have lunch. Most of the restaurants were closed, but we found a small “creperie” that was open and we stopped there. After trying the local galletes and crepes (and beer) we took the D7 and continued on our way to a place I really liked called Pointe du Raz. It's a very touristic place (although it was totally off season, so barely any tourists around).

It's a dramatic coastal landscape with crashing waves and a lighthouse in the ocean on top of a rock (La Vieille). There's also a bigger lighthouse in the Point itself and a memorial called "Our Lady of the Shipwrecked". We took a walk around the area and then back to the car to visit a few other places.

We drove by a town called Douarnenez and our last stop was a village called Locronan which is a small medieval village, very well preserved and which apparently gets a lot of visitors during the high season. I had enough time for a short walk and some photos. From Locronan we drove back to Brest passing Tal-Ar-Groas and Le Faou along the coast.

In Brest and before finally going back to Kerallan, Jean-Yves took me to walk around the marina, close to where he works. We took a stroll there for about half an hour. In the marina we saw a local navigator, Thomas Colville, who was preparing for a “solo, ‘round the world sailing record-breaking attempt” in his catamaran.

Then it was back to Veronique’s house for a last night. We had a great rice and shrimp dinner, good wine and good conversation.

I woke up early the next morning to watch Veronique feed the horses. Then we had breakfast and Jean-Yves took me out for another day of driving; this time along the northern part of Brittany, all the way to a place near St-Malo.

I didn’t have much time left before I had to leave France and I still wanted to visit St-Malo, Mont St-Michel and the beaches of Normandy (all this in about 1 week). Jean-Yves kindly offered to drive me to a place near St-Malo; where I was to stay with a French family for a few nights.

We left early in the morning and during the 8 hour-or-so drive we went through a lot of towns and stopped briefly in a few. The towns we passed and/or visited were: St Renan, Pludalmezeau, Lannilis, Plouescat, Roscoff, Morlaix, Lannion, Perros-Guirec, Paimpol, St Briel, Lamballe, Dinan and Hirel.



We arrived in the afternoon in a very small village by the side of the road called Le Fedeuil, near Hirel. That’s where I was going to stay the next few nights. Jean-Yves left me there and we parted ways, as he had a fairly long drive back home and he had to work the next day (Thanks for everything Jean-Yves!).



(The story continues in the next post)

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