South Brittany Coast and St Nazaire Tiki-Tour

Isnt that sight wonderful? It is what we saw, at 8am this morning, as we came around a corner, having first seen the lake, and voila! There was this fairytale castle. It is the Chateau de la Bretesche, formerly the home of Anne of Bretagne, former Queen of France.
The Gate and moat house on the other side. Being a little bit cheeky...ok...a LOT cheeky, we drove (make that I drove) in through the main gates and past the gate house to the parking lot and then down the driveway towards the Chateau. We didn't get out of the car, it being a freezing morning, so we did our 'drive-by shooting'...meaning we shot photos from inside the car with the windows down!

YEs, it does have a moat, actually.

Such pretty light, this Autumn light.

On our way south, today, we passed through the hillside town of Herbignac. There was a lovely view down the valley behind it, but the wind was something fierce and Waz kept joking about how I love cooler weather, and asked if THIS was cool enough for me...I guess my teeth were chattering!
So many churches we have found do not have the level of decoration we have come to expect, almost. Lots of churches were bombed during WW11, so perhaps these places have done what they could for as little as possible to make the structure whole. They cost a lot to build, and these are not wealthy communities, or large ones, for that matter. The population in this small town is around 1500, but there was a modern Mairie (Police Station/town hall) and library just behind the church.

You can see how much the façade has been altered, in this photo.

and in this one too.

Out back was this interesting waterfall...if that is in fat what it is!

Our quest was to get to the coast, today, and this was one of our first sightings. The coastal towns all have a similar look and feel to them, and even though tourist season in Brittany is over, there were plenty of people about...mostly Brits, with plenty of French thrown in.

Things don't really get going until around 10am, and this town was no exception. The wind hadn't died and was colder at the coast, of course. We had arrived at Pipriac Sur mer thinking it might have warmed up a bit...NOOOOOO! At least not in exposed areas.

We walked the town looking for a Grand Crème (it was 10.30am, after all!) and enjoyed the folksy nature of the place with it's many little cottages with gorgeous gardens all stacked close together and facing the sea. The town itself looked out onto a Low Tide with people everywhere collecting shell fish of any and every kind, we were told. We did enquire as to the nature of the gatherers, and were rather amused to see Brits and French alike, don their boots, waders in some cases, or slippers and venture forth with buckets and rakes...anything to pry the oysters off the rocks.

We wondered why this fella was exerting himself, until we saw that low tide was probably the best time to attach his dinghy to the buoy!

as usual, anything grows out of everything. These ferns were no exception, and the tropical flowers obviously love this coastal climate.

A well in a restaurant courtyard. The woman putting out lunch time tables through we were a bit daft, I think, taking photos of the well!

It is apple season in full swing, in Brittany...for the renowned Apple Cider and for the fresh apple juice. At the Chateau, the orchard was full to busting with apples, and we had been waiting for the pickers to arrive...they are making juice this year, apparently.

Futher around the coast road we drove, and loved some of the sights. These dinghy will be for learners, later in the day.

What a glorious beach! You can see why so many Parisians and English flock to the coast of Brittany for their summer holidays.

see that little while road around the coast line? that's the one we took, at least to Turballe, before going inland to Gerande, which is known for it's Salt Marshes. This whole area is very low to the ground, as it were, and Salt marshes are everywhere.

We stopped beside this fish seller, right on the sea wall. She was happy for me to take photos:)

The salt collectors or gatherers are families who have done this work for generations, apparently. The salt is well known for the quality. That is a pile of salt you can see in the middle foreground.

As we came into the town of Guerande, this puppy was hanging out of the window watching it's master talking to someone parked on the road side. I stopped all the traffic in order to get this photo. One thing we will say about the French...they are very tolerant on the roads, and appreciated that I had to take this photo. Lots of smiles!!

Guerande is yet another fortified city. This on is from the 15th century, like so many of this design. These are the St Michel Gates, on the left, that we entered the old city.

A barrow full of salt. It looked like every other person had put their hands into it, lol.

Salted meats in one of the windows...it looks wonderful!

And, because I wasn't in a plane to take this kind of photo, I photographed a poster in a shop, to show you the Salt Marshes on this part of the coast.

It was 1.30pm before we found an out of the way restaurant for lunch. I am a bit overloaded by galettes and Crepes, but had that for lunch anyway, and Waz took advantage of the Moules Mariniere...Mussels!! yum! with Frites, of course. The Frites, by the way, are fabulous! Haven't had a bad lot yet.

This was my dessert...and I immediately wished I hadn't ordered it. I was hungry when the menu came around, but after a Galette of ham, cheese and egg, this chocolate crepe was a bit much, with all that Chantilly cream!

Old stone (Pierre, in French) walls with this lovely red vine, are just waiting to be photographed!

...and it appears that scooters are the preferred way to travel everywhere!

Most of the seaports are heavily 'walled' because that is the Atlantic Ocean out there!!! You only have to see some of the photos of a winter sea crashing against light houses and these sea walls, to realize why. The tide runs very swiftly down the middle of the channel, we noted.

We stopped at the end of the line at Le Croissic. This quaint fishing village is also touristsville, with most of the shops along the waterfront geared that way. Lots of discounted wares, being the end of the season.

no boats our size, which was surprising in some ways, but not in others. Plenty of sail boats! of course....lots of wind!

We sure pack a lot into our days out. We were determined to get to St Nazaire, even though we had been told there wasn't much to see there. This large port at the Loire Estuary where it meets the Atlantic Ocean was heavily bombed during WW11, and only in the last 40 years, has it become the major ship building and shipping port that it is today. One of the most amazing things about this place is this bridge. We could only travel at 50kph (30mph) over it due to the high winds, and being a large river in this part, in particular, we were happy to go slow. Being buffeted at the top made us wonder how much the whole bridge was swaying.

We literally went over the bridge, and back again, with a wee stop for a toilet break, on the other side, and a jaunt down the end of the road to the beach, to turn around and go back.

This is a fishing shack, and net. At high tide they catch a lot of fish this way, apparently.

On the return journey, we felt even more insecure...I could swear that the wind had come up further and the bridge felt like it was moving underneath us. It probably was!

Per usual, Waz was taking photographic direction from the driver....this is to our right, on the down river side, coming back over. That is a cargo ship. Can you see the cruise liner further down?

We hit the motorway home, past the large Airbus campus, just behind the port. Waz managed to photograph a large air carrier coming in to land. I don't have access to his photos right now, so perhaps another time!

We arrived home via some small towns, which we hadn't seen before. :)