| Ten days before we were due to sail to Santander, Spain we had a phone call from the Caravan Club (we booked through them) to say that the Santander ferry had a problem with its propshaft and had to be towed into Brest for repairs. What did we want to do? We opted for the same sailing dates, but went from Poole to Cherbourg and we would skip going to Spain. Fortunately we had not booked any campsites nor had we made any arrangements to meet anyone. We left Poole in late May on a nice sunny morning. Stern of the Barfleur with Poole in the distance |
| Sailing through Poole harbour |
| Sandbanks – the upmarket houses you can’t see from the road. |
| On arriving at Cherbourg we motored down to a campsite, at Pontorson, near Mont St. Michel where we stayed for 3 days. |
| Wikipedia description ‘Its unique position — on an island just 600 metres from land — made it accessible at low tide to the many pilgrims to its abbey, but defensible as an incoming tide stranded, drove off, or drowned would-be assailants. The Mont remained unconquered during the Hundred Years' War, a small garrison fended off a full attack by the English in 1433. The reverse benefits of its natural defence were not lost on Louis XI, who turned the Mont into a prison.’ |
| Main street Mont St. Michel. | Sue at one of the very large taps |
| Door furniture built to last – definitely not from B&Q |
| View from the top of Mont St. Michel back towards the mainland. There have been many changes to the access to the Mont. There is now a P&R system about a mile away so no access for private vehicles. |
| On the ramparts |
| Abbey cloisters |
| Abbey refectory |
| Crypt of large pillars – These pillars are supporting the abbey. |
| The tread wheel crane used to bring supplies to the prisoners. Some prisoners would walk inside the wheel to rotate it. |
| If you look at the previous photo of the abbey you will see that there is no archangel on the top. The archangel was replaced, after renovation, earlier this morning when I cycled there from the campsite. I knew nothing of this until a Frenchman asked when it was replaced (he spoke very good English). He was expecting the replacement to arrive at 11.00 by helicopter, but they had done it earlier. Helicopters were buzzing around for quite a while removing building materials and taking photos. The archangel is 4.5 metres high and weighs half a ton. |
| Stuart at Mont St. Michel (a selfie) |
| More exercise on the campsite |
| After 3 nights in Pontorson we moved onto La Yole campsite near St John de Mont on the west coast of France La Yole transalated is a ‘skiff’ used for moving about the local marshes. There are plenty of roads now. |
| St John de Monts beach – it goes on for miles |
| Stuart at an ‘art’ installation by a roundabout | BBQ in the awning (not recommended). It was raining hard |
| French postage stamps celebrating ‘Euro 2016’ |
| The forests around the campsite had plenty of geocaches so we tackled quite a few of them. The forests were lovely to walk in and there was hardly anyone around. |
| A rather large log pile |
| A day visit to Noirmoutier, an island 20 kilometres by 7 kilometres wide. It is joined to the mainland by a bridge which was built in 1971. Notice what Sue is wearing – it is June! |
| Unused buoys – at the main port |
| Jettee Jacobson, Noirmoutier |
| Morris Minors on tour – there was a large gathering of Minors at a local campsite |
More to come ………
No comments:
Post a Comment