Overwhelmed at Le Mont-Saint-Michel...

This driving trip has had many highlights, but we may have saved the best until last. From Saint Malo and its walled city we drove for less than an hour around the edge of theBaie du Mont-Saint-Michel, , having our first glimpse of Le Mont-Saint-Michel in the foggy distance from a point near Cancale, and as we approached it, the island commune grew in size on our port bow. The countryside was flat, but the bay endures 10m tides, so the tidal wash area is vast. Roads and towns stay cautiously above the high tide mark, but we noticed a lot of levy banks as storm precautions. During our drive, the bay's water line was always kilometers away.

The magical Mont-Saint-Michel and its abbey.

As we arrived, it was immediately apparent that Le Mont-Saint-Michel is geared for massive influxes of visitors, with a complex network of secured carparks. Our hotel, Le Relais du Saint-Michel was chosen because of its proximity to the island, its view of the island, and as such, we had privileged access to a nearby carpark. The code the hotel had given us months ago didn't work ("that often happens!"), so we had to ring the property for a new one, which did let us in, and we stayed there for four days. Our room had a direct view to the Mont, about a kilometer away as the crow flies, and, it wasn't actually raining, so even though we had plenty of time, we immediately set out.

Our first glimpse of Mont-Saint-Michel was through a lot of gloom from Point du Grouin.

The hotel was not perfect, but you can't beat this view!

Easily the best placed hotel opposite Mont-Saint-Michel.

It's a two kilometer walk along a boardwalk which culminates in a causeway (a bridge, really) across the sandflats to the island. There's a free shuttle bus which runs every 12 minutes from the public carparks to a point on the causeway about 200m from the island. It was getting dark and the weather was threatening, so we waited for the bus, but when it arrived, it was already overloaded. This was the moment we discovered that Mont-Saint-Michel is unlike everywhere else we have been this trip - it's a tourist destination year round. That bus was full of Chinese visitors, and we were later to understand out that tour coaches come every day from Paris, a 14 hour round-trip, including a sumptuous lunch somehwere and 3-4 hours at the Mont. We couldn't get on that bus, so we walked. It's a delightful experience to approach the Mont slowly so you can truly absorb the growing monolith and study the grey sandy floodplain. We repeated this walk several times during our stay here, but used the bus frequently as well, especially when rain fell or threatened.

Some tourists like to approach the Mont via the 2km causeway this way.

View from the back of the abbey looking across the bay.

Flock of ducks, judging by the noise.

The tides at Le Mont-Saint-Michel can go up and down an incredible 10m. At low tide, the water retreats a long way, and a famous recreation here is to walk on the dry sandflats. For safety reasons, licensed guides are recommended for walks of up to 13km and 6 hours. They say "you can't outrun the rising tide", and there's quicksand. We stayed off the sand - at low tide, it looked grey and soggy as far as we could see. Some people ventured a couple of hundred metres. It was preparing for this trip that we learned of tidal coefficients viz: the size of the tide in relation to its mean, usually varying between 20 and 120. Iconic photos of Mont-Saint-Michel surrounded by water are taken at coefficients over 100, and only occur several times a year. We didn't see that, coefficients were 50-60 during our visits, so no really high or low tides. We could see tidal flows, but they weren't dramatic.

Getting dark and the Mont lights come on.

Looking out to the bay, canons (bombards) were apparently installed by the English during their brief occupation.

We saw lots of rain but not too many rainbows over Mont-Saint-Michel.

It all started in 708AD when Aubert, the bishop of the nearby town of Avranches> had a sanctuary built atop a 1km offshore rocky island called Mont-Tombe at the mouth of the Couesnon River in honour of the Archangel. The island was small, a mere 7Ha in area. The unusual location made it a focus for pilgramage, and over centuries it was expanded again and again. Buildings were built over the top of existing buildings, sometimes not very well it seems, by reinforcing or demolishing the prior structures. The first mention of an "abbey" there was in the 9th Century. Models on exhibition in the abbey show the first signs of a village being spawned in the foothills of the rock by the 11th Century growing to take all available space by the 18th Century. The abbey looked substantial by the 11th Century, but it continued to grow in stages several times thereafter. Louis XI used the abbey as a jail in the 15th Century and in the 18th Century, the French Revolution did away with religion and made it a state prison. By the 19th Century, the mont and the abbey were seen as national treasures, and Napoleon closed the prison in 1863 and it was declared a monument historique in 1874. As part of a massive restoration project (~1890), a huge steeple was added to the abbey with a gilt statue of the archangel Saint Michel, and excavations discovered some lost chambers of the abbey. Somewhere in this complicated history, Mont-Tombe came to be called Mont-Saint-Michel.

The huge and most spectacular spire atop the abbey.

Saint Michael, the archangel, tops the 32m spire. Sculpted in 1897 by Emmanuel Fremlet.

It's free to visit the island and the village, after all, it's just a regular town, and for a fee (10EUR, the Tourist Office offers discounts) you can follow a clearly marked and interpreted trail through the abbey. This was well worth it, and, having climbed the steep paths, we spent a long time exploring the abbey gradually coming downstairs through various layers. It's truly fascinating. Like hundreds if not thousands of huge churches in France, it is an architectural masterpiece, although few would have the complexity of this one, having been expanded so often on such a small footprint. The abbey itself still operates as a church, we saw nuns and monks (or lay-people, what would we know?) wandering around, and at 12:10 were lucky enough to see and hear one gentleman ring the main abbey bell as a call to a mass. He then led a few devotees into a private chapel.

Great tiled floor in the abbey nave.

To the side of the abbey church, the cloisters, a place for monks to meditate.

The central abbey bell is rung as a call to prayer.

Dripping water tap high up in the abbey grounds, complete with the abbey seal!

The abbey refectory where monks would dine in silence.

The guests hall underneath the rectory was where royalty and nobility was received.

The great pillared crypt dates from 15thC and supports the abbey church built above it.

The knights hall with two huge fireplaces, columns holding up other structures.

The abbey's role as a prison is interesting. It was closed in 1791 to convert it to a prison, initially to hold clerical opponents of the republican regime (up to 300 priests at one point) when it was nicknamed the bastille des mers. Over time, up to 700 prisoners worked in a workshop set up in the abbey, making straw hats, which started a fire in 1834. The prison population included high profile political prisoners and influential figures, including Victor Hugo, who (from inside) launched a campaign to restore what they saw as a national architectural treasure. The prison was finally closed in 1863 with 650 prisoners relocated and the abbey was transferred back to the church, until it was declared a monument historique in 1874. The only sign of this prison history during our tour of the abbey was (a replica of) an intriguing hoist system used to bring in provisions. No doubt the prisoners themselves manned the wheel driving the hoist!

The incline used to hoist provisions up to prisoners.

The pulley system and sled, used to hoist provisions to prisoners when the abbey was a jail. It's a replica of middle age systems used to haul building materials.

The village, which clings to the eastern slopes of the Mont, is crammed into a miasma of steep, narrow, twisty lanes. A "main street", about 3m wide, is where most commercial establishments front, including hotels, cafes and souvenir shops. The cafes get bad reviews, but we found them welcoming enough, if overpriced, and a great place to rest weary bones for the price of a beverage. We also had several meals within the village.

Village homes overlooked by the abbey.

Panoramic view of the village from higher up in the abbey.

Tiny cemetery at Saint-Pierre's church.

Narrow lanes and lots of steps to get around the Mont's village.

Relatively modest interior of the Saint-Pierre parish church below the abbey and in the village.

The Auberge Saint Pierre was a great place for an afternoon drink. It had the only open fire we have found on this entire trip.

We didn't eat upmarket too often, but this restaurant on Mont-Saint-Michel was an expensive exception.

At Mere Poulards, the signature item is omelet cooked on a wood fire.

The inside of Mere Poulard's backs onto the natural wall of the Mont.

Roofing detail within the Mont's village.

The Couesnon River runs into the bay directly opposite Mont-Saint-Michel, and centuries of human meddling with it (farming and agriculture) have caused it to deposit silt in and around the Mont threatening to landlock it. Grassy meadows either side of the causeway are evidence of this. To preserve the tidal flats around the Mont an impressive and expensive adjustable dam, le Barrage, has been built at the mouth of the river. It fills up at high tides, and manages the low tide outflow in a schedule to reduce silting. The barrage was directly over the road from the Relais, so we were able to have a good look at it. And nearby, is a small village of hotels and shops, including a supermarket, as well as the vast parking lot.

Le Barrage, a complicated series of gates opposite Le Mont Saint-Michel designed to manage tidal flows to prevent sedimentation and weed growth around the rock.

Decorated cows abound in the shopping precinct on the mainland.

Cute jigsaw of chocolates on sale in the market. The white Breton capped sheep are a local delicacy, spiced by the salty environment they live in.

Meanwhile, the free shuttle buses kept rolling across the causeway, bringing in loads of vistors. Some buses were packed, coinciding with the arrival of a tour bus, others were nearly empty. Mont-Saint-Michel was the one place on this entire driving trip where we encountered tourists in serious numbers, even though its winter. Sometimes those tour buses stayed overnight at our hotel, others were just day trips. Our three-night four-day sojourn here seems very relaxed by comparison, but we like to take things slowly. The tourists were Chinese and Japanese who have clearly discovered this location - we hardly saw overseas tourists from anywhere else at Mont-Saint-Michel.

Free shuttle buses run frequently from the car park to within 200m of the Mont, but nothing beats walking to absorb the grandeur.

While we were at Mont-Saint-Michel, French TV news was obsessed with the moment of Brexit at midnight one night.

Wide Beach and a Walled City...

Promenading on the beach is a popular pastime.

It's about 180km from Morlaix to Saint-Malo, so this day would be the biggest drive of our trip, but a long way short of mammoth 6 hour drives we have done in the USA, for example. The road was a motorway the entire way, so we made short work of the distance, even though it rained almost the entire journey. Towards the end of the drive we crossed over the department boundary into Ille-et-Vilaine, although we were still in the region of Brittany. We arrived planning to have a baguette and cheese for lunch at a nice spot opposite the beach only to discover this city is an overdeveloped nightmare. There's nowhere to park or even stop and overlook the beach. For much of the beachfront, the road running alongside the coast (as shown on our navigators) has been converted to a footpath, not a bad thing, but it means that you can't approach the beach even for a glimpse when in your car.

Fort National, just off the walled city, was built by Vauban in 1689.

This guy and others were tame and used to being fed, we think.

The western end of downtown (where our hotel turned out to be) did have a street, Chaussée de Sillon running along the beach but there was no parking available there, and even if there was, any view was obstructed by a huge seawall. Depressed, we found a grotty spot in a nearby port area to have our picnic lunch, and then went looking for our hotel, Le Nouveau Monde, another inspired "damn the expense" choice, but in a fabulous location overlooking the water. At last we could see the beach! The hotel has its own paid parking, but we were extraordinary lucky and sprung one of few free and unlimited spots directly opposite. This is a walkable town, so we left the car there untouched for four days.

Our hotel bedroom, real comfortable and fabulous beach view.

Buildings along the Saint-Malo seafront all appear to be for holiday accommodation.

The beach at Saint-Malo, wow! The tidal amplitude here is up to 10m and the surface slope is shallow, so at low tide it's a vast expanse of drying sand, ideal for the French habit of promenading. Luckily, the sand is fine enough and yellow, making it great looking and good walking. At high tide, the water comes right up to the seawall, and if the sea is rough (as it was on one night) it's a spectacular sight as waves crash over the wall and flood the footpath and street until it flows away. The waves are tempered by attractive artificial groynes of tree trunks, but they are no match for big seas. This sight, of the entire beach waxing and waning, will be our enduring memory of Saint-Malo.

At low tide the beach is wide...

But high tide and a storm is an entirely different look/

Tree trunk groyne walls seem designed to manage big seas.

Taking advantage of the wild conditions.

Saint-Malo is a huge tourist destination, maybe the first we have come to on this driving trip. We read that its population swells by about 400% in summer. The port has a huge ferry terminal which receives arrivals from Portsmouth, Poole and the channel islands of the United Kingdom. We can imagine how crowded with English tourists this place becomes, and wonder if there's an equivalent number of French tourists visiting England? It's winter here, and all those overseas visitors were missing, we didn't hear anyone else speaking English, but the town was still buzzing with French visitors who presumably drove here, and lots of locals probably enjoying the pre-season lull.

Lovely old posters encouraging visitors to Saint-Malo.

Notable Brittany intellectual François-René de Chateaubriand (d1848) who thought of himself as the greatest greatest writer, philosopher and lover of his age is buried in St Malo and celebrated here greatly.

But this attention meant something we haven't seen before on our drive of Brittany, businesses being open! Not all of them by any means, but it was a pleasure to be able to walk the streets and have a real choice of bars, cafes and restaurants, and a decent number of other stores. And the rigorous dining hours enforced elsewhere seem to be relaxed somewhat - now you can get lunch outside the slender 12:00-13:00 window, and have dinner befor 19:00. We took advantage of this flexibility to eat and drink at hours which better suit our stuck-in-the-mud stomach habits.

Bars in Intra-Muros were popular especially with local college students during their breaks. We avoided them to stay away from their cigarette smoke.

Open creperie inside the walled city.

Cute shopfront for a store selling products manufactured in Brittany.

Shop inside the walled city.

The first township at what is now Saint-Malo was established by the iron age Celtic Gauls in the 100 years BC. After the fall of the Roman Empire, Amoricans arrived in droves around 600AD+- from Britain to escape instability there, becoming the Bretons of Bretagne. Wikipedia says that the modern Saint-Malo originated in a monastic settlement founded by Saint Aaron and Saint Brendan early in the 700'sAD with the name coming from a follower of Brendan, Saint Malo or Maclou, who immigrated from Wales. Much later, the town was notorious for corsairs, French privateers and sometimes pirates who extracted tribute from English ships passing up the Channel. Breton native Jacques Cartier (d1557) from Saint-Malo was the first European to describe and map the Gulf of Saint Lawrence and the Saint Lawrence River, which he named "The Country of Canadas", after the Iroquois names for nearby settlements, gaining credit for the "discovery" of Canada.

Inside the Saint-Vincent cathedral of the walled city.

Somewhere in that history, a large and fantastic walled city, La Ville Intra-Muros, was built in or around Saint-Malo. It's a real city, much larger and more impressive than the one we saw in Concarneau, and is packed tight with apartments, shops, cafes, churches, schools and colleges. It is a live city, with its own population, and we saw schools and colleges with many students operating inside the walls. This city, which the buses call Intra-Muros, was a great highlight of our stay in Saint-Malo.

Main entrance to Intra-Muros at night.

Chimney pots as an art form!

Architectural detail within the walled city.

Fort National just off Saint Malo beach reflected in the wet sand.

Interesting ceiling detail in the walled city fish market.

A sad true story lies behind this restored statue of an "ugly woman with baby".

Symbol of the old walled city may refer to the guard dogs set loose after gates were shut at night.

The Germans occupied Saint-Malo during World War II, and refused to surrender even towards the end when defeat was inevitable. No doubt the walled fortifications provided a great defensive position. So, in late 1944, the historic walled city of Saint-Malo was almost totally destroyed by allied shelling and bombing. After the war, the city was rebuilt over many years and, by looking the the buildings, its possible to identify the ramshackle buildings which survived the attack in amongst the orderly (but tight packed) new constructions. The Germans did apparently allow French citizens to escape the bombing, and its interesting to read the (excellent and comprehensive) interpretive signage all over the city. The French were being defended, of course, and so the signage mostly refers to a "fire" politely without much reference to how it came about.

Memorial to victims of hatred and genocide in WW2.

Blocks and blocks of new apartments all built after the bombing on WW2.

Magnificent dormer windows and chimney structures on the post WW2 walled city apartments.

There is an elevated walk around almost the whole of Intra-Muros. We walked it several times - it gives a great view of the inside of the city, of the port area outside, of statues of notable historic figures, and of the beaches and offshore forts. It's good exercise, being several kilometers in length with lots of steps. And, when it's sunny and not blowing a gale, its very pleasant up there.

The walk along the ramparts goes around 90% of the walled city.

Ferries bring in masses of visitors to Saint-Malo, especially in the season.

Panorama from Saint-Malo's walled city.

Only the ducks were using this rockpool on the Plage de Bon Secours.

There's probably a lot more to Saint-Malo than we saw, but that beach and the old city were enough to keep us entertained (and fed and watered) for four days. We took the opportunity to do some laundry too, with everything within easy walking distance of our hotel, so our rental car had a nice rest, and a good wash in the rain, while we were here.

An amusement park suddenly burst into life one midweek afternoon - no school?

The Viaduct of Morlaix ...

Now heading east en route in the direction of Le Mont Saint Michel, an hour's drive from Saint-Mathieu took us to the city of Morlaix. We came here to see one thing only, its famous viaduct, although as we drive, we realise a lot of valleys are crossed by spectacular viaducts. It was a wet drive, and at Morlaix we had to face the reality that regular rain squalls would cross our path.

The viaduct as seen from Place Allende.

Our hotel in Morlaix was the Hotel de l'Europe and, depending on how you look at it, is the only one we have stayed at right in the centre of a historical downtown. From that read, nowhere to park. We unloaded by driving up onto the footpath, and found parking, like everyone else, but driving around. Everyone's goal is to avoid pay parking, and our most reliable spot was at a supermarket about 500m away. The hotel itself is a "grand old dame", occupying almost a full block next to the hotel de ville. Its common rooms were opulent with period fixtures and furnishings and very high ceilings. Our room was much the same, with a juliet balcony overlooking a twon square (really a car park). The Europe claims a distinguished past with construction before 1792. It became a hotel in 1816. Famous guests include the Queen of Portugal (1831), Duke & Duchess of Nemours (1843), Napoleon Bonaparte's brother (1880), dowager Queen of Italy (1908), and the visitors book shows a visit by Charles de Gaulle. Who knows who has slept in our bedroom?

The grand old lady of the Hotel d'Europe.

Soggy view from our hotel room across the Place de Viarmes.

The staff at Europe were so friendly and helpful, and delighted to hear that we were from Australia. The booking.com system apparently doesn't tell them. They spoke excellent English, and the manager was quite familiar with Australian politics. He thought that it was time we ousted our climate denying prime minister who is an embarrassment to the country and a danger to the world.

Another view of the cross-town viaduct.

The viaduct is not a Roman creation as we first suspected, but is much more contemporary, being built in 1863 to accommodate the new steam railway. Its location across downtown was rejected by the city council but ignored by the railway company. We've heard that story before! But in a massive tactical blunder in WW2, the British air command sent US bombers to destroy the viaduct - only one bomb slightly damaged the stategic railway link, the other 42 bombs missed it but killed 80 inhabitants including 39 children at school. To add insult to injury, another railway viaduct far away from any innocent village could have been but was not the target. The Germans repaired the damage to the viaduct within "hours". We loved the viaduct - not only is it so photogenic, it provides great views over the town and gives it much character.

The reason the viaduct is there, a speeding TGV leaving Morlaix station.

Little wonder the council opposed the viaduct, which goes almost right over the cathedral.

The lower way on the viaduct is a pedestrian path.

Morlaix Town Hall. When we first arrived, that square contained a weekly market which attracted lots of people.

Old town Morlaix is very walkable, even though we had to dodge occasional rain and watch out on slippery, steep cobblestoned streets. We saw a produce market in the Place des Otages, under the viaduct, and not far away, around the Place Allende, there are some notable elderly buildings, most particularly the 1520 Duchess Anne’s house, now a museum, but so named because Duchesse Anne of Brittany is said to have visited it during a pilgrimage, but this is an urban myth - she died before 1520. The town's interesting buildings include the Hotel de Ville, a grand theatre, and the Post and Telecommunications office.

The 1520 Duchess Anne’s house.

In the Place Allende, the Ty Cos said to be the oldest hotel in Morlaix.

External house wall in Morlaix old town.

The Riviere de Morlaix runs past the supermarket where we found a parking spot, goes under buildings and roads and indeed the viaduct for maybe 500m, then pops out in a huge marina which is extraordinary because it's a long way from anywhere navigable. Its water is held by a lock gate, and at low tide, the river is a muddy swamp for maybe 10km. We can't imagine the hundreds of yachts there motoring down the river at high tide for a day's sailing, so maybe they just all park up here for the winter, and moor downriver in summer?

The top end of the large Morlaix marina, seen from the viaduct.

Looking upstream from the Morlaix marina. A lock keeps water in during low tides.

The Riviere de Morlais is almost dry at low tide.

A panorama of the bay at the end of the Riveiere de Morlaix with the light of Ile Louet in the foreground, yet another fort on the right!

At the eventual outlet to the river, we found a bay full of rocky outcrops, tiny islands, navigation lights, a fully fledged lighthouse, and of course another fort. Our pictures were taken from the unlikely Plage de Tahiti in the township of Carantec. We could have driven further, but the weather was miserable and a bar was calling, so we scarpered back to Morlaix.

At Carantec, this road which is fully submerged at high tide, leads to Ile de Callot. That tractor probably gets a got of work with stuck cars.

We found the La Chope a pleasant place to have a cleansing ale.