Old cities... or are they?

Stunning medieval (and later) settings...

A quick clean up in the morning and left Vannes as we headed north to Saint-Malo on the north coast of Normandy.

We deliberately took the smaller roads and there was not much traffic, lots of cereal crops (a lot harvested) and maize crops along with some small mobs of cattle out grazing. We have now got into the habit of comparing the different route options on Pugs GPS, in some cases the difference between the 'fast' and 'short' options can be minimal in time difference.

Saint-Malo is a port city in Brittany, north-west France. The city was founded in 1 BC and by 4 AD it became a fortress due to its location in a prominent bay position. In the 5-6^th century the area got many Celtic Briton’s fleeing the UK. It had a short lived independence when it became a republic in 1590-93. In the 1800’s it became the home of French privateers, ie Pirates!, unofficially sanctioned by the French King.

During WWII in late August/early September 1944 the walled city of Saint-Malo was almost totally destroyed by USA shelling with British naval support. The city held 800 German troops when the assault began as part of a garrison of over 12,000 in the wider area. Over 10,000 Prisoner's Of War were taken by the Allies.

Saint-Malo was rebuilt over a 12 year period, 1948-1960, and it looks like a late 1800’s walled town today.

Next stop was Mont-St-Michel, UNESCO World Heritage site since 1979. Known for its stunning island location it also has some mainland town to serve the tourists. Everything we read said it would be busy with tourists, but worth it. It was on both counts!

The island is joined to the mainland by a 1 km long causeway and can also be walked to at low tide, and is about 7 hectares in total size. First Inhabitants date from 708 AD when Aubert, Bishop of Avranches, had a sanctuary built on the island. It went on to become a major focus of pilgrimage and in the 10^th century the Benedictine’s settled in the abbey and the village below grew. It is a good example of the feudal society of the 9-15^th century with the abbey and monastery at top (ie God), the great halls beneath, the stores and housing below that and then outside the walls the common people (farmers, fishermen). The fortifications were in place early in the town’s history to repel invaders.

As religious importance waned it closed as an Abbey and from the late 1700’s to 1863 it was used as a prison. 1864 saw it become a French historic monument and restoration work began.

It was very busy in the lower streets, even though we had deliberately arrived late afternoon, . Not so busy in the Abbey itself, and cooler too. A walk in the streets, within the walls, was like being in Harry Potter’s Diagon Alley. With the tide being out we walked around the perimeter of the walls, on the sand/quick sand… a bit sticky on our shoes but saved washing our feet! We did keep our eye out to see however, the tidal difference here is above 10 m, and can travel so quickly over the expansive flats that it is rumoured to be faster than galloping horses.... let alone gallumping Noel and Caro's...

Now that's what you call a fireplace!

Back over the causeway, and back to our car, and arrived at Saint Lo about 9 pm where we had a pre-booked hotel on the outskirts.

As we had already eaten we googled to see if there is sights to see on an evening walk; there wasn’t as 90-95% of the city was destroyed in the first days of the D-day landing offensive with at least 800 of the citizens killed. The town was rebuilt on the original site in accordance with the wishes of the remaining citizens. Casualties of war that are probably overlooked by New Zealander’s.

Where in the world....

The fruit-ality of....

Our blog briefly leaves sequence for a day, to try and group like topics together, or is it just the effects of the days activity described below...

After one day touring the Normandy D-Day beaches, see the following post, we drove to our pre-booked accommodation of 2 nights. What we saw on the drive through was lots of cereal harvesting… and a circus! Still with camels, zebra, buffalo, donkey tied to a fence and a lion in a cage all set up on a town reserve. A little surprised as we didn't realise such animal circus's still existed.

We have a 2 night stay in a charming BnB property, a 1840's house near the town of Cambremer in Normandy. Ate at a local restaurant that evening, still very hot, 29 C at 9 pm. A storm was forecast for the evening but all we got was lightening/wildfire with no rain. Dropped the temps a little however which was appreciated.

Following a bit of research during our early trip planning it was discovered that the "Route de Cidre" existed in this area, obviously the translation to The Cider Route is pretty compelling for Caro who's been known to enjoy the odd drop, and who is Noel to argue with the pursuit?

Our host has rented bikes for us to do the said cider trail, and had them delivered and ready to go. After a lovely breakfast with homemade preserves and with hopes of a cooler day we were on our bikes. With a 40 km loop mapped out as per supplied map, brand new rental bikes (we mean actually never used!, nice bikes as well) and hopes of a cooler day we were off!

The terrain is gently up and down, so although a long haul up in places it was always equaled with a long free wheel down! We cut out a small section early on, so some 5 km less than originally planned. Resisted the urge to stop at cideries before lunch, there was a couple enviously passed however!

Stopped at the village of Bonnebosq for morning tea and then at Beuvon-en-auge for lunch.  At lunch cider was the compulsory accompaniment, the local custom of drinking it from a handle-less bowl. Both very cute towns with buildings of Tudor and clay construction. This is cereal and apple country with small mobs of cattle grazing. After lunch we rode through horse breeding country, stopping at Du Pont cidery which is a famous one for the region and is a Chateaux in stunning gardens and surrounds.

 Entrance to Du Pont Cidery

Beuvon-en-auge, once again another village voted prettiest in France

Although a little skeptical of drinking liquid from a bottle labeled Du Pont we had a taste… yum… then with a large bottle tucked in our pack we headed back to our local village of Cambremer. 35 C showing on the temp gauge at local pharmacist… on the shady side of street!

With energy levels diminishing we stopped at one more village cidery for a tasting, tucked another bottle into backpack and back to our BnB.

A great day out riding on sealed roads all the way with very little traffic, often any traffic being large tractors and trailers loaded high with bales of straw.

Walked halfway to the village (actually very close to our accommodation) for dinner at the Creperie, there are lots of creperie's about in fact eating at one for lunch also. Since we have enjoyed the local flavours all day we had a Gallette each, one a Camembert, Bacon, Egg and Cream whilst the other was Liverwurst Chorizo, Mushroom and Cream… and of course a 750 ml bottle of cider, yum! The effervescent young waitress offered to provide a take home cork with our bottle if we didn't finish it..... our answer, why would we not finish it????

Yes, it was hot work but a really fun day in extremely pretty countryside.

Selfie!!!!.... not sure why the long face....