Detours to Mont St Michel & La Rochelle

Sculpture outside the Portsmouth D-day Museum
The lines on each block represent the curve of
each landing beach.

We packed up, cleaned up the cottage, dropped the keys into the Dorset Cottages office and left Corfe for Portsmouth because we were booked on the night crossing to France. M and I had taken Charlie up to the Vicarage the day before because Brittany Ferries had a policy for all dogs to be muzzled if out of the car and they weren't allowed in the cabins. We couldn't make poor little Charles stay in the Van all night without us.

We had time before the 6pm sailing to visit the D-day museum and to take Granny and Gramps through the Mary Rose and Victory at the Maritime Museum before having to board.(See my Feb 2014 blog for details of these attractions.)

Lilly pond outside the musuem

101st air born - jeep delivered via glider.

We were disappointed at leaving the South of England without making it to Penzance and being able to visit the English St Michael Mount around the bay because it would add to the doubles of our plans for France. The D-day museum and Tapestry in Bayeux were on our list. In the Portsmouth D-day Museum has a huge tapestry of the events and people leading up to, during and after June 6 is permanently housed. Willow spotted the 1st Special Service Brigade (this unit became know as the commandos) commander. His name was listed as Colonel Lovat, she remembered the old fellow who breed Charlie had said that the dog's pedigree name - Scout Lovat- was given after his commander in WWII. Lord Lovat had a personal piper who followed him into battle. As you go past this panel of the embroidery(no.17) you hear the piper's description of what happened on the day(yes he survived!) and snippets of his playing. It is amazing that his bagpipes didn't become a primary target for the Germans.

Panel 28 from the Overlord Tapestry showing King George VI, General Eisenhower, Feild Marshal Montgomery, Field Marshal Brooke and Prime Minister W.Churchill. They were never together on teh beaches of Normandy as in this pose.
A section of the "Overlord" Embroidery tapestry designed by Sandra Lawrence and made by the Royal School of Needlework to commemorate D-Day and the Normandy landings in 1944 . The Overlord Embroidery was commissioned by Lord Dulverton of Batsford as a tribute to the sacrifice and heroism of those who took part. Inspired by the Bayeux Tapestry, it traces the progress of Operation Overlord and the events preceding it. 

The tapestry is 272 feet long and took five years to produce. The scenes it depicts are based on wartime photographs held by the Imperial War Museum.  Words and image from: http://www.iwm.org.uk/collections

A military band entertaining the tourists at the Gunwarf Quay.

Capt. M reporting for duty aboard the Victory

All of this furniture was rolled away within 5 mins of battle stations being called. Every window on the Victory became a gun placement. Admiral Nelson's uniform in the display cabinet rear port.  I presume it is a copy.

 Checking in for the Brittany Ferry at Portsmouth is similar to the Dover Ferry and Chunnel crossings except because we had managed to book cabins we were also given room keys. If you want to do the same in the busy summer season book well in advance.  The official site didn't have any cabins available when we tried to book in April but M managed to find another site that had the three 2 berth(bunks) cabins available. The alternative is to book a reclining chair - I was glad that we didn't have to make Granny and Gramps do that so soon after their flights from NZ. There are some very fancy ones available that even have their own lounges.

The nerve center of the ship as it maneuvers out of port.  M was quite convinced that his assistance was required.

After a parade on deck as we sailed out of the Solent and watched the sun fall down behind England we headed in for dinner. There is a cafe, a cafeteria and an a-la-carte restaurant on board. We were very happy with our window seats, watching the calm seas and giant tankers as we ate. If you order the creme brulee plan to share it, very big but good enough to make you want to eat it all. The cafeteria opens at 5:30am for breakfast and offered full English and Continental options. We arrived at St Malo at 8am so an early brekky was a good idea. Granny and Gramps were able to change poundage for Euros at the Bureau de Exchange after 6 and Willow had been able to polish up her French a bit while ordering the meals so we were all ready for our week in France. Oui oui!

I got given a very hard time about my nautical outfit! The wind was blustery but warmer than expected.

Our day's destination was M's work colleague's Gite(holiday house) in deep dark Perigord, just under 500km from St Malo. We bravely planned to break our drive with a drop into Mont St Michel and the pretty little harbour town of La Rochelle. The first we knew from the movie the Scarlet Pimpernel and the second from the Hornblower series. Knowing that we were to be land locked for most of our week we craved this last splurge of seashore.

Mont St Michel - the Abbey is on top and forced the development of new building techniques to build level rooms on the slopes of the rock. One lower room has enormous ceiling arches which are the foundations for part of the chapel above. The village grew around the base of the rock.

Shuttle  -                                                    New road into the Mont  -                 One way to the top via many shops and cafes.

M punched the coordinates for Mont St Michel into the GPS as we disembarked, reversed his windscreen transparency to remind him which way to go around round abouts and off we trundled. The Mont looks a long way away from the car park we were directed to so we were pleased to discover that there was a free bus shuttle service. Walk and cycle ways were available but the 45min estimation confirmed that it wasn't an option on this long drive day. We spent far too long at this incredible place. At a coffee and diesel stop somewhere down the A83, I saw a toffee tin with a cartoon of Brittany and Normandy ladies in regional dress fighting over the Mont in a tug of war. In reality it was the only French fortress to withstand English attacks during the 100yrs war. What began as a hide away for hermit monks became a powerful fortress Abbey with riches that its Bishop could wield with great influence. It was served by a growing village at the base of the rock. It became a prison during the revolution years when the state religion was humanism and is now one of the most visited sights in Normandy/Brittany, raking in the tourist dollars. A new, higher busway is being built to give access even in the highest tides that used to make an island of the place. 

So many stairs and steep paths to the top. Even more after buying your ticket to enter the Abbey.
Pay 50c for the public toilets at the bottom!

This wonderful platform to view the English channel and the French coast was once mostly covered with the Abbey Church. It would have been a great spot from which to spy enemy approach attempts. The last order of Monks to call the Mont home where a poor order of puritans called the Maurists, when the grand towers of Robert de Thorigny (champion of Eleanor of Aquitaine and her husband Henry - King of England and Duke of Normandy) crumbled they used the stone to construct a classical facade which shortened the building considerably.

Inside the church.

A beautiful courtyard at the top of the Mont surrounded by cloisters.
The carving on the pillars are all different and elegant.

How did they get supplies up to the Abbey? Monks or Priests who needed to do penance were put into the wheel like rats and had to run to turn it which had a chain attached to the large rope which in turn was attached to a sled. This was pulled vertically up the wall loaded with goods tied onto it. A very interesting bit of medieval engineering. 

La Rochelle was a little detour from the quickest route to the beautifully renovated and provisioned cow barn we were heading for in Londie (a tiny group of homes 30mins south of Bergerac). So we very strictly instructed that it would be a quick walk around, drink stop then off. We tried but even with fluking a car park right in the centre, we still dallied for nearly an hour, too cute for a look and leave. 

So many wonderful roof decorations to photograph - I have quite a collection now.

La Rochelle and her famous marina. The forts in the background kept her trade shipping safe, especially to the Dutch traders when La Rochelle was a Protestant stronghold against the persecution of Catherine de'Medici's Catholic France. It was also a safe port for Napoleon's fleets looking for defense against the English.

The town gate has a ship in full sail as its weather vane.

Left: Iced Teas, Chocolat, Creme Cafe while keeping an eye on a busker with 6 or more dogs and a large fluffy cat that performed tricks and musical items.  Right:  A whole street of ice cream and sorbet sellers, alas no time.

The bracelet with the cross celebrates the
wealth of the Mont and the strength
of the protestants in La Rochelle
Willow is very unhappy that I am using
this photo in my 'nerdy blog' that makes
"all my stuff look lame and geeky"

I get quite panicky feeling when I have to rush through somewhere that looks so interesting when I know how unlikely it is that I will ever be back. I would be hopeless on a bus tour, the driver would eventually leave without me. Granny probably wouldn't even make it on in the first place with her nipping off as she calls 'I'll just get a shot of this'! This time she was delayed because she found a seagull that had to travel home with her (a carved one) while Willow was selecting one of the string bracelets she's collecting from our travels and Petal a lighter.

We pressed on, keen to arrive before dark as we had been warned that it was in an off the road, rural location. As we passed through Bergerac we were reminded of Granny's black and white cat named after the detective show of the same name. Banners welcoming the Tour de France were still hanging on one of the round abouts. We crossed the Dorgodne River for the first time and saw our first multi arch bridge which turned out to be the common design in the area. We passed through Monpazier as dusk began to fall onto little roads that twisted and turned pass hay fields and large tracts of wild woods. We spotted deer munching at the long grass and imagined the famous boars rootling around after truffles under the oak and chestnut trees. People in the area are warned not to venture in these during hunting season - what a nasty holiday adventure that would be. When we left early morning after our week we saw a red squirrel as it leaped across the road and up a tree, a family of some hedgehog looking creature without any prickles scurried to cover in a ditch, a quokka looking animal lay dead on the road and owls perched on fences, looking for the last morsel of the night.

None of these photos are mine - the deer was too far away, the one on the right was dead and the family of the one in the middle were too fast!  Center: a ragondin.  Right: a patapouff

Just as the last light faded on our arrival, we pulled into the right driveway and were thrilled to find freshly made up beds and enough milk in the fridge for the first coffee the next morning. Thank you previous guests.

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Paris by Edward Rutherford