France, Brittatany, Summer 2011, Chapters 1 to 4

 Liz and I worked a season for a UK holiday company in Brittany, France. To jazz up our reception area I wrote a series of "off line blogs" chronicling our days off. Meant to be a sanitised travelogue, of the sort you find in an in-flight magazines, it didn’t always turn out that way.

SUMMER 2011

Liz and Pete’s Day Out.

Off-Line Blog the First

 

         Although we both know France quite well, having variously worked and holidayed here, Brittany is new to us and we are discovering it for the first time, just like many of our guests. So here is a little off-line blog which we hope will help you along the same enchanting journey of discovery.

We turned right out of the camp, drove into Arzano, left through the village and straight on. Having foregone breakfast for a quick(ish) getaway, coffee and croissants were top on our hit list. Plouay, the first civilisation we came to is a small market town, with a street of little shops and opposite the white painted church the Les Temps Modernes, a typically local French bar. Inside, the obvious regulars, perched at the bar sipped a continuous supply of Rosé wine and each time a new customer arrived Madame had to nip around the bar to receive a kiss on each cheek. Every time someone left hands were shaken with ordered precision. We asked for “deux grand Café Crème”, or two large white coffees. For croissant we were directed next door to the Boulanger Bonnette for Pain au Chocolat Maxi and Brioche Abricot, an apricot topped sweet bun. Liz reckons it was the best Croissant she has ever had, and she should know, her mother was a baker!! You are allowed to take them into the bar to eat with your coffee. How very sensible. 

We watched Plouay life come and go for a wee while before heading to Larmor Plage. The centre of the town boasts a traditional fairground roundabout and a small car park. We parked opposite the carousel and strolled along the promenade, a beach to one side and a row of restaurants on the other, a perfect place for a plate of oysters, moules, fish, or an avocado and salmon terrine. Meat and salad also served.  The sandy beach looks like a great place for budding sand castle designers and a little way along there were rock pools, perfect for future marine biologists to paddle and catch a crab or two. Boat watchers will be kept fully occupied with the plethora of craft plying the channel, everything from enormous container ships, naval frigates, huge catamarans, to a flotilla of small craft. 

Onward we cried and took the coast road towards Fort Bloqué, (D152), surfers abounded, a fully rigged tall ship ploughed the April seas, a rare treat in this age of speed and diesel turbines. Restaurants and bars came along at regular intervals where you can wave watch while enjoying the local fare.

We pottered onward, through Guidel, where we passed La Fregate, a creperie previously visited. It has a nautical theme, excellent pancakes, good wine, a very agreeable atmosphere and friendly chatty patrons. Recommended. We ended up in Pont Aven, a small tourist orientated town of galleries, Breton biscuit and souvenir shops and crucially, places to snack. We took a late luncheon in one of the street front cafés, Maison Keraval, near the bridge. A simple meal of a ham salad baguette and a Crusard, a sort of small cheese, ham and onion pizza, just what the doctor ordered, fresh, home made and delicious. The café is attached to a Pâtisserie where you choose your food. So tempted were we by the pastries we took some home for tea.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

So ended a very tranquil day of wanderings, general chilling out and good food. 

 

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In Pont Aven, we parked in a blue marked bay and despite asking a friendly local if this was OK came back to the car to discover a small slip of paper tucked under the wiper. A friendly note:

           

Blue Zone, Disk Compulsory

It could have easily been a fine, so thank you Pont Aven for your tolerance of strangers. A quick search of the net revealed the following info.

Blue Zones

          In many cities and towns there are ‘blue zones’ (zone bleue), indicated by blue street markings. Here you can park free for one hour between 09.00 and 12.00 and from 14.00 or 14.30 until 19.00 from Mondays to Saturdays, with no limit outside these hours or on Sundays and public holidays. Parking isn’t restricted between 12.00 and 14.00, meaning you can park free from 11.00 until 14.00 or from 12.00 until 15.00. You must display a parking disc ( disque de contrôle/stationnement) in your windscreen.

         These are available free or for a small fee from garages, travel agencies, motoring organisations, tourist offices, police stations, tobacconists’ and some shops. Set your time of arrival in the left box, and the time you should leave by is displayed in the right box, e.g. if you set 10.00 in the left box, 11.00 is displayed in the right box. If you overstay your free time, you can be fined.

 

 

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Liz and Pete’s Second Day Out

Having earned ourselves day off number two, not it should be noted by merit, but simply by still being here we decided to go and see something incredibly old. The stones at Carnac pre-date Stonehenge and for that reason alone are worth a visit.

             Our route took our through Plouay and on towards Lorient where we picked up the signs for Carnac making navigation a doddle. We stopped for our customary coffee and cake in Plouharnel at the Bar Le P’tit Breton a café attached to a Boulanger Patisser. Fine cakes and coffee and this time we avoided the second cup in an attempt to stop the caffeine knocking our heads into the middle of next week.

  

            Approaching Carnac centre we spotted signs for “The Alignment”. The

site consists of three groupings of stones stretching over 4km. They provide a handy little road train which lets you take in the whole caboodle, a 50 minute round trip.

        You could stand there thinking rocks, just rocks but the magic of the site is wondering just why prehistoric man put in the enormous effort to build the thing. Back when survival meant hunting, staying warm, short life expectancy and probably staving off other tribes competing for your food and water, having enough leisure time to work on a major construction project must have meant a fair degree of social cohesion and organisation. So stand and gaze on the alignment and tinker with a notion or two, try to know the unknowable, knowledge lost long, long ago in the minds of the Neolithic builders of an ancient wonder.

             Perhaps it was something like this: Ancient man had no way of understanding their world, no clue to the reality of Earth’s orbit of the sun and the vastness of the space in which our little world exists.

            Struggling to come up with a rational explanation for night and day, the seasons, for the stars and for storms and disease they constructed a world of superbeings, of Gods who created and controlled Man’s existence. The next logical step, you could surmise, was to try and control these Gods, to communicate with them, to appease their moods, to flatter and praise them, to bribe them into bettering your lot. Thus the impetuses for the great effort was bought into being.

            Or if you are of a more cynical disposition you could wonder perhaps if the whole thing was just an exercise in power and wealth. Perhaps the leaders of the tribe hatched a plan to bring status and food on themselves, and exploited the stories and legends of petulant Gods to persuade the masses that good crops would be guaranteed, pestilence would cease and new borns would live long and prosper if only they lugged a few thousand rocks a few hundred miles, and let the leaders design the whole thing from the sanctuary of their suddenly especially comfortable caves.

           Whichever direction your thoughts may take you our course took an impulsive detour down “The Teardrop”. We drove down towards Quiberon and if kite surfing or sand sailing is your thing this coastline is the place. Anything above a force 4 and you’ll be flying. Even on a moderate April Tuesday the water was full of water leaping kite surfers. We spotted beach sailing kit for hire and any of the many surf shops along the way would surely be able to help you get waterborne.

       In Quiberon, a seaside town of restaurants, ice cream shops, small children with chocolate covered faces and it must be noted a shortage of parking we partook of an excellent luncheon in a restaurant on the Esplanade. There were several eateries to choose from, and for no particular reason we gravitated toward the Bar/Brasserie, Le Voilier. Crepes were ordered together with white wine. Liz was particularly impressed with the glass, an important detail overlooked by so many establishments, the elegant crystal magically imparting its gravitas to the liquid contained within. After Gallets with tasty fillings of Roqefort and walnuts, Liz, and goats cheese and lardons, Peter, we conveniently forgot a pledge to eat healthily whilst in France and waded into a desert course. Peter had the Breton speciality, caramel ice cream with a chewy, syrupy and wonderful cakey thing, the Breton name printed on the menu bearing no relation to its pronunciation. Liz took a pancake with caramelised apple. Scrummy.

Home then, to dreams of Rachel Welsh licking a Cornetto and chucking giant rocks at architects in mammoth skins.

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A Quiberon establishment with a serious identity crisis!!

 

 Descendents of an ancient food source prove that Darwin was right.., once on the plate they hove evolved to sifting at the table, but given their choice of drink colour, may still have some way to go before getting a social security number. 

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Peter and Liz’s Off Line Blog no. 3

 

A short missive this time as we spent most of the day either lazing on a beach or grazing on a salad.

 

          It was definitely beach weather, not a cloud in the sky, the irresistible call of the running tide leaving us no choice, we headed Atlantic coastward to Guidel Plage, no more than half an hour from here, where we found a stretch of golden sand. Away from shops, arcades, and deckchairs this was the perfect spot to sit on the grains and watch the world go by, surfers surfed, children tunnelled to Australia and dogs chased by the waves ran in and out of the water, tails wagging so hard you could feel the breeze. Seagulls swooped low over the sea, suddenly folding their wings to plummet, in a fair imitation of a rock, into the surf only to swoop up a few moments later, the oceans fish population suddenly depleted by one. A perfect spot for any family looking to sandcastle, paddle, and just enjoy a spot of coastal bliss. Black suited surfers crested the rollers before tumbling off into the briny and strolled, board in hand, in and out of the spume. We just sat and watched in the heat of the midday sun (we are English) and avoided getting overly sun blushed.

 

When we finally decided we had been nicely braised it was time for a spot of lunch and we headed nowhere in particular. Nowhere in particular turned out to be the left bank of Doëlan, a village of one quayside restaurant packed with locals dining al fresco, a definite recommendation. We asked for a sandwich but this was not something they lowered themselves to, but, said the waitress, “ze salads are verrhy good”. We declined and sipped our Perrier’s until something arrived on a nearby table. It was a no brainer. Salad Chevre, goats cheese on toast served warm on a huge pile of greenery. One of our better impulse buys we decided. And we will be going back for a serious meal, Le Suroît, closed Wednesday’s.

 

             And apart from the weekly trail around Intermarché so ended another day out in Le most definitely Belle France.    

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Peter and Liz’s Off Line Blog no. 4

 

            Another day out and this time we decided to sample a local attraction. Until today we thought a submarine pen was something aquanauts used to write home with. It turns out, surprise, surprise that they are enormous concrete structures, up to 3½ meters (11½ ft) thick in places, nowadays used mostly as industrial units. One of these vast indoor spaces is home to the French Cold War submarine La Flore and to be able to get inside one of these incredible machines is an unmissable opportunity. Once a cutting edge technological marvel it’s now difficult to imagine it as ever being state of the art. The thing that hit us as we toured the hull was the incredible dedication and professionalism of the men who crewed it. Cramped, surrounded by the internal organs of a mechanical leviathan and sleeping and eating an arms length from a bank of deadly munitions isn’t most people’s idea of a decent job. Yet remarkable individuals set sail in this tin can, living for months at a time in an environment most of us wouldn’t be able to cope with for a week, let alone a full tour of duty. Get inside a sub and you get an inkling of the lives of an astonishing breed of men. It’s a sobering experience and helps put into perspective the angst we feel when Asda runs out of our favourite brand of margarine.

 

 

 

 

We were awestruck by the courage of the people who crewed this sub and saddened that we humans find it necessary to invest so much resource in a machine with such a macabre purpose. It’s so much more than a collection of valves and iron and engines, it’s a glimpse into the mindset of a species.

 

 

After an absorbing day of looking at old (the 70’s old??) war making equipment we felt in need of a contrasting and life affirming experience or to use the short word for it, food.

 We do like to eat out and a bottle of wine, an aperitif and maybe a liqueur makes the evening. The problem, of course is these pleasures are incompatible with getting to and from any decent restaurant, without forking out for a taxi or one of us foregoing the booze. What a find therefore is the restaurant on site here at Ty Nadan. Most excellent fare, the homemade pâté de fois gras, with ginger toast and fig chutney is to die for. Every pâté is England these days seems to come with onion chutney, those TV chefs have a lot to answer for, and so this makes a refreshing change. Before the main event a little palate cleanser arrived, a Normandy hole, apple sorbet in Calvados. Probably worth the journey from England alone.  If, as they say, we eat with our eyes then the mains were devoured before they hit the tablecloth. The Sea Bass with Chorizo Crust and Roasted Vegetables (Liz) and the Tian de Fillet Mignon du Porc (Peter) were delicious and both welcome variations on the sort of food we seem to find back in blighty these days. All washed down with a bottle of Cahors, a light buttery red with a damson nose, so says Liz who has a talent for these sort of things. Crème Brulé and the cheese board rounded off a fantastic meal, and the journey home took moments, what more could a couple of itinerant hosteliers ask for?