Beyond Vannes

Geographically Vannes is set in the centre of the Gulf of Morbihan, more or less, so there is an arm of land out above and below it. After we left the town we drove along the southern peninsula right out to the end.
First stop was a cider museum, with tastings afterwards. There was a film, and then a self-guided tour round the old machinery, all well signed with plenty of information. There was even a bee hive, because of the importance of bees for pollination. I haven't smelled that smell since we used to have a hive in the garden when I was growing up. At the end there was a little orchard with a collection of different types of cider apples.
The photos are of two cider presses and a mobile still.
The first cider press is a central screwed one - there was also one with a long transverse beam running across the top. I'm afraid I don't know how to translate the technical terms into English.
The granite one is the only one of its type that the museum was aware of - it dates from 1929 and is cut from one piece of granite. Easy to clean was the advantage, apparently, and there was no need to take it apart each year for maintenance.

We got to taste four different ciders. The one we liked best was what they called an aperitif cider - crisp, sweet, slightly acidic. That was the one we bought a couple of bottles to take away. We also had a sweet, a brut and a semi. Me, I love the Breton cider. It's low alcohol, often only 2% or 3% abv, and it really tastes like fresh pressed apples. I wish we could get cider that good here. Traditionally in the restaurants it's served in little jugs (a pichet), and drunk from pottery (or if you're upscale, china) bowls. But when we had some down near La Rochelle, it was served in pottery beakers.

Along the way after that we stopped and went for a walk along some estuary land. We saw some egrets and plovers as well as herons and swans.

Port Navalo is the little town - if you can call it that -  at the tip of the peninsula. We had another walk here around the end of the headland...

Quick picks

Still working on my French photos - we're not even out of Brittany yet! But the weekend is never a good time, even such a gloomy, wet one as this was.
A reflection of Frank Sherwin bridge in the Liffey one morning last week. The river was so still and the sky was so blue; the bridge itself is a bit burnt out in the photo, but I took several and I think this one best shows how the reflection almost looked like a road in the water - almost a Yellow Brick Road.

As we were away I don't have wide scope for picking favourite cards for September. The apple and pear ones were fun, a different colouring style to normal, and I enjoyed doing the little pony for one of my nieces - they all go riding every week, so I thought a pony stamp could earn its keep. This one reminds me of the Norman Thelwell books my sister used to collect.

We have a robin around, but I don't think it's Mrs Robin, as it initially flies to the feeder and picks seeds from that, and will only come to the back step after it's sure all is clear. I'm hearing a lot of robin territorial noises, though, so there's another robin around somewhere for sure. This evening when I went out to open the back gate for C there was some lovely birdsong, but it was too dark to see who was singing.

A good book - Hotel on the Corner of Bitter and Sweet; there seem to be some very negative reviews on Amazon, but they're in the minority. We both enjoyed it, though initially C had thought he wouldn't bother reading it, and his mother is currently reading it and enjoying it a lot. We were just discussing this evening how hard it is to choose books in the library - a lot of the time I'm very happy with what I pick from the shelf near the desk of recommended books, but there has to be a better way of finding what we like.

Vannes part 2

C is a sucker for boats and marinas, so I think his first view of Vannes after we'd driven through it and found a (free) car-park and he could relax, already endeared the town to him. A canal leads from the town out to the Gulf of Morbihan.

 

Vannes is an old town, and there are many timbered houses in the centre.

There's also an old castle and the old city walls and ramparts...

If I recollect the sign on the walls, the covered arcade in front of this building was where people used to do their washing in the river.

...and a small cathedral:

Vannes - part 1

I think of all the places that we visited, Vannes was C's favourite. He says he'd love to find a camp site near there and go back for longer. I remember visiting there one evening when I was about thirteen or fourteen - I can still remember the smell of the chocolate crepes we had in the car on the way home. It was less romantic in daylight, but still a wonderful place to wander around.

These photos are mostly just shop signs...Sadly the paper shop (2nd photo) was closed for their annual holiday - it would have been a lovely shop to go into and browse around.
The 6th photo is typical Quimper faïence style. I must take a photo of the little lollipops I bought for my brother's kids - their wrapping is a similar style.
The 7th photo, the little money bag, was a sign on the Crédit Agricole bank. It has a rather mediaeval feel to it, I think.

By the lake

A couple of times we visited Lac de Guerlédan, an artificial lake created in the 1920s for hydroelectric power. Being late in the season it was quiet, but there were still some watersports going on, and we saw a cruise boat going up the lake. C was impressed with the quality of the sand on the beach we stopped off at - certainly more sandy than many beaches here.

At one end of the lake is the Abbaye de bon-Repos, an old (founded in the 12th century) Cistercian abbey which had fallen into total repair, but in the '80s the local community started work on restoring it. The church is still a ruin, but the abbey building is well restored. There was an exhibition on monastic food and cooking, which was interesting to me. In the cloisters they had planted beds of wild-flowers - beautiful.

 

Model of the abbey as it appeared in the 18th century

Old pigeon loft / dovecote

By the lake

A couple of times we visited Lac de Guerlédan, an artificial lake created in the 1920s for hydroelectric power. Being late in the season it was quiet, but there were still some watersports going on, and we saw a cruise boat going up the lake. C was impressed with the quality of the sand on the beach we stopped off at - certainly more sandy than many beaches here.

At one end of the lake is the Abbaye de bon-Repos, an old (founded in the 12th century) Cistercian abbey which had fallen into total repair, but in the '80s the local community started work on restoring it. The church is still a ruin, but the abbey building is well restored. There was an exhibition on monastic food and cooking, which was interesting to me. In the cloisters they had planted beds of wild-flowers - beautiful.

 

Model of the abbey as it appeared in the 18th century

Old pigeon loft / dovecote