Brittany Holiday Part 3 - a Mysterious Harbour and a Poignant Reminder

Where do the days go?! I'm still blogging about a holiday I returned from a month ago!!

The next part of our trip brought us to the Cote Sauvage on the Quiberon Peninsula. This really is a magnificent coastline.

We had a wonderful walk and the only downside was having to keep Spencer on the lead......

....as we didn't want to lose him down one of the rocky gullies.....

In the distance we spotted some kind of structure built in the rock......

 You can see it a bit better here.....

So we wandered over to investigate......it was fascinating......

...A old harbour built into the rocks. Unfortunately there wasn't anything to give us any information about it and I haven't been able to find anything since.

Was it possibly a wartime harbour where boats could hide and then ambush??

On our journey back to the ferry port, we stopped at Gouville-sur-Mer and enjoyed the beach.

 And then onto Veulettes-sur-Mer, where we climbed the hill to investigate these old guard posts......you can just see them on the hill...one to the right of the white cliff and one in between the lamp post and the building.....

......there were fabulous views of the town from up there....

These concrete 'pillboxes' had been built by the Germans during the occupation of France in World War II......

.....from inside......

You can see the flags from the war memorial from inside....I found this very poignant......

A last stroll along the pebbly beach........

....before heading for Dieppe and home.

Thank you for visiting.

Maggie xx

Brittany Holiday Part 2 - We Stumble Upon a Megalith

Gosh I hope you're not fed up with all these holiday pics!

To tell you the truth, I love sharing my photos and I know you enjoy them from your lovely comments (thank you!) but these posts are as much for me as I'm pretty rubbish at printing out photos and organising albums.....

So here goes....Brittany Holiday Part 2....

An overnight stop at a lovely aire at Locmariaquer on the South Coast led to a long walk along the La Falaise beach....

Chris demonstrating how quickly the tide comes in......

Lots of seaweed and rock pools....

and a jelly fish.........

As we returned from the beach, we spotted this menhir or standing stone and went to investigate.....

As we got closer we could see there were several large stones or megaliths on the ground. Chris said he thought it was a dolmen which I remembered was a some sort of ancient tomb....

After some research later on, I discovered that this place is Les Pierres Plates (the flat stones....makes sense!).....a neolithic burial chamber. 

Chris and Spencer were keen to investigate further.......

It was fascinating and very atmospheric.......so old.....around 3000 BC.....

Chris discovered a decorated pillar.....

......so beautiful.......but not yet deciphered......looks like a maze or map?

I found this photo which shows Les Pierres Plates from above.....pretty impressive.....

Courtesy of http://locmariaquer.info/f10f_pierplat.htm

Apparently many of these stone dolmens would have been covered in small stones or earth but weather over time has worn these away and now just the stone burial chambers are left.

Les Pierres Plates have really piqued my interest and I'd love to visit some of the many other megaliths that are found in Brittany.

To be continued......Part 3 coming up soon.....hooray!.....(it will be the last part!)

Maggie xx

Brittany Holiday Part 1

This trip we wanted to make it all the way to southern Brittany. We took the ferry from Newhaven to Dieppe and then travelled down through Normandy. We didn't want to overstretch ourselves with too much driving each day so we made a couple of stops along the way.

We had an overnight stop at a very pleasant aire in Herouvillette.....

Then the next day we travelled to Saint Brieuc and found an aire at nearby St Laurent de la Mer where Spencer had fun on the beach....

One more long journey and we arrived at this lovely aire at Scaer in Finistere, Brttany. We were the only ones there. We loved it so much here that we returned to stay here two more times during our holiday.

There was a wonderful track to walk along....

including this old Art Nouveau railway bridge....

and a river for Spencer to splash about in....

We moved on to Glomel near the Lake where there is a large dam which dates back to the early 19th century...the Barrage du Korong.....the lake was originally constructed to feed the Nantes-Brest canal.

We found a beautiful path behind it....

where Spencer could have a paddle.

It led to beautiful woodland.....

and more paddling!

Moving on to Huelgoat and another lovely walk around the lake there......

On the West Coast, we found this fabulous beach, La Plage de Sainte-Anne.....

We discovered this fascinating cave there.....

...and had to have a peek inside.....I don't know how deep it went but it looked pretty deep into the cliffside...

inside looking out.....

 There were seams of rock on the beach and we found this one which was very worn by the tides... I named it the Seven Sisters as it looked like the heads sticking out of the sand!

The tide came in pretty fast and it kind of creeps in so that you don't notice it. Within five minutes of meeting the Seven Sisters they were submerged in water.....

Another stop in the pretty town of Josselin. We had a lovely meal out at a creperie by the beautiful old church...those extending gargoyles are amazing.....

There was a big street market the next morning but it was too hot for too much shopping.....we did buy some lovely crusty bread and some apple slices...

We spent a weekend at St Nolfe....peace and tranquility by the mill....

Our aire was next to an animal centre with donkeys and goats....

Part 2 coming soon!

Thanks for visiting.

Maggie xx