Mystical Stones and Bastille Day
We headed inland from the coast after we managed to drag ourselves away from the beautiful beaches and found the small town of Pont Aven. This town is based around a port on a heavily tidal river and has a huge number of galleries with some really impressive artwork. Paul Gauguin started the artistic heritage in this town when he set up an artists colony here in the 1850’s.
This was always a quick stopover on our way to Carnac which is renowned as the site of the biggest collection of neolithic standing stones in the world. There is no agreement among academics as to why the stones were arranged like this but they do think it was possibly related to the early peoples religions. The original theories were that they were temples but this has now fallen out of favour with the latest theory being that the stones were some sort of warning.
The megaliths are 6000 years old and were erected between the fifth and third millenia BC.
The stones in Carnac are spread over a large area and we spent some time cycling around to see the different areas. There are several sites but the largest, Le Menec, has 1,050 stones spread over 950 metres.
As well as the large fields of standing stones (menhirs), we saw some single large stones (also menhirs) , collective tombs (dolmens) , and a large burial tomb (tumulus) which you could go inside.
Our next stop after Carnac was the medieval town of Vannes. We found a good aire to stay in a few kilometers away from the city, just next to a little touristy island with a couple of lifeguarded small beaches and a saltwater swimming pool.
The bus stop for the electric bus into town is right outside the Aire. It was market day when we took the bus into town and the whole of the town centre was given over to a busy and vibrant market centred around a big indoor fish market.
At one time Vannes was surrounded by big walls but only small sections of these are now left. A pretty park is in front of the main section of the remaining walls and a row of old wash houses run alongside the river where people used to wash their clothes.
Outside the walls is the port which is now a marina for sailing boats and a nice space for families to walk around as well as plenty of restaurants to rest and refuel.
We knew it was almost Bastille day coming up and we wanted to make sure that we had somewhere to stay for the holiday weekend knowing it was likely to get very busy, so once we left Vannes we headed to Josselin and small medieval town with a big chateau on the banks of the river Oust. The community provides a large free Aire for motorhomes only a couple of hundred metres outside town, alongside the river.
The Chateau, built in the 14th century, is a building with two faces and was the seat of the Counts of Rohan. On the river side it looks like a fortified castle with imposing walls and big turrets while the side facing town resembles a big manor house facing its beautifully manicured lawn and gardens.
Inside the chateau the ground floor is accessible and the original furniture is on display providing some insight into how it looked in its heyday.
The town itself has a big church and a lovely central square surrounded by eateries and brightly painted half timbered houses.
One of my favourite things in Josselin was a small walled community garden, allegedly in place since medieval times, growing lots of different types of herbs which had signs up inviting members of the community to take part and to help themselves to herbs that they needed. I thought that this was lovely.
Like most towns in France Josselin had plans to celebrate Bastille Day and we were more than happy to join in. Under the walls of the castle a rock band called “FAB” gave a free concert – mixing greatest rock hits of the 70s/80s with some, what I assume were, French classics. They were pretty good.
The only thing that was a bit odd was the breast-feeding backing singer of a toddler who spent most of the time running around the stage knocking things over, – all while singing at the appropriate points. He did get involved though, shaking a tambourine at certain intervals. A real family affair!
After the concert the whole town decamped to the banks of the river to watch a pretty impressive firework display put on by the commune.
This was followed by a local restaurant hosting a dj with drinks and dancing late into the night.
All in all Josselin is a beautiful town and was a great place to hide out during the busy Bastille weekend !
While most of the town nursed their hangovers we headed to our next stop in the Paimpoint Forest, an ancient forest where, legend says, Excalibur was buried in the stone and where Merlin is buried.
The town itself is pretty small and dominated by an old abbey, which was first constructed in the 7th century but was then destroyed before the current building was constructed in the 13th century. We went for a walk around the lake and through the woods. It was all very nice but not enough for us to stop for very long.
We drove to our next destination – the beautiful medieval village of Rochefort-en-Terre, another of the French “Petite Cite de Caractere”. This pretty village is very popular with tourists which is reflected in the large number of restaurants and galleries lining the high street.
We enjoyed wandering the streets up to the “Chateau” – a big house overlooking the town, spent a bit too much of some very nice ham and cheese and had a very peaceful nights sleep in the motorhome parked just below the town.
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