Tapp's Travels

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The beaches here are indeed superb.  Even when there is almost no beach at high tide!  This is our “local” patch, Plage de Trez-Bellec, at sunset.

The next beach further down the coast was the Plage de Pentrez …

Further on there’s a string of beaches, one better than another.  Some are so long they have several names depending on where you meet them!  Confusing, but all the beaches are huge at low tide.  Big enough to run land yachting races.  Here are two “Chars à Voiles” rounding the downwind mark.

At the south end of this long beach there was a restaurant.  The only (open) place in France that refused to serve us coffees – the crêperie, Breizh Lipous.  OK, it was moving towards lunchtime and the place was geared up for diners.  But it was spectacularly empty.  They could easily have accommodated us for half an hour on the terrace.  They were still almost empty an hour later as we drove past on our way south!

Independence Day – 4 July.  Today it’s a trip to Camaret-sur-Mer on the middle of the three prongs on the end of the peninsula.  A quick stop for a stroll on the beach at Kerloch.  These beaches are sooo good for level walks!

Just up the road we passed a really interesting restaurant, Sovaj’.  A quick u-turn for a closer inspection.  It looked really good.  Just our cup of tea!  But “exceptionally ” closed for a family wedding.  Ah, well.  Easy come, easy go.  We are going to look at our alternative campsite.  Le Grand Large.  Had we come here rather than to L’Armorique, we would have stayed here.  No mountain-side.  Big pitches, many with great sea views.  But a bit far from many of the things we want to see and do.  Another time maybe.

So it’s Camaret for lunch.  Wow!  Tourists!  Restaurants!  Dozens of them on the harbour wall.  A bit of a random choice backed up by personal inspection and a check of reviews on the interweb.  We settled on the Crêperie Le Kerguelen – and very good it was too.

After lunch we wandered aimlessly in the backstreets of town, immediately behind the row of restaurants in Saint Thomas.  This is the artist quarter where 25 creative spirits were busy creating stuff in their galleries and ateliers and then trying to flog it to the tourists.  But the tourists were all beside the harbour.  We were on our own!  There were graphic artists, photographers, sculptors – and our favourite  – the cat lady.  She will make you anything you like – so long as it’s a cat!  Very specialist!

Back on the habourside, we walked out on the pier past half a dozen old boats falling to pieces in the second boat cemetery we have seen on the peninsula …

… to a little church, the Chapelle Notre-Dame-de-Rocamadour.

Yes, it was a cooling break, but there’s something afoot.  There was a choir warming up …

… then musicians got weaving …

then a lone piper (a different one! – with a different type of bagpipes – but still not the Breton type.  But it played “Amazing Grace” superbly well!)

Everyone was getting ready for a concert in support of the French lifeboats.  There was a lot of practice, but not much actual action – certainly not before we left the church.

Further along the pier, there is a Vaubon tower – the inspirationally named Le Tour Vauban – it came into service in 1693.

And a more recent statue that was installed two years ago in memory of local mariners lost at sea.

Before heading home we called at Le Pen Hat beach.  This is about the most westerly point of the peninsula that is publicly accessible.   The Pointe du Toulinguet is military land.  Basically a headland fort (designed by Vauban, of course) with a semaphore at the furthest point.  From the beach, looking eastward there is a collection of towers on the horizon.

The ruins of the Manoir Saint-Pol-Roux.  The chateau was requisitioned by the Germans in WWII and destroyed by allied forces in 1944.  All that remains are eight towers.  And, unbeknownst to us a couple of hundred metres further to the south is an “alignment”!  Dozens of standing stones.  The Alignments of Lagatjar.  In the 17th century  when the site was first documented there were over 600 stones.   Asterix and Obelix must have been busy!

We haven’t been to the north-pointing finger of land at the end of the peninsula.  Today’s the day!  But first there’s a place we’ve passed several times and have decided that we are going to haul in there this morning.

Tal Ar Groas (about 10 kms from camp) is not much more than a roundabout at the junction of seven roads!   But there is a supermarket, two petrol stations, a biscuiterie, a specialist burger place, a boulangerie and a school.  And the Bar Café de la Forge.  Coffee time!  Early on this trip one of us has added a new style of coffee to their drinking habits.  “La Noisette”.  A small strong  espresso with a spoonful of milk froth on top.  But we like it in a big cup with a side serve of very hot water.  In a busy bar that’s quite a mouthful of French – but we do sometimes get more or less what we want!  Other times, less so.  Getting it in a large cup is the main stumbling block!

This is where the hardened locals come for their alcoholic beverages.   Most of them stand drinking at the bar.  It’s usually cheaper there than at a table.  And by the looks of some of them, the accumulated discount will be quite substantial when it’s time for home!  We prefer a table where we can mix and dilute our drinks in peace!  Here, it’s OK to bring in a little something from the baker’s next door, but that’s not always the case.  It pays to watch the locals for guidance!  On the odd occasion when we’ve done this we always feel guilty and try and disguise what we are up to!

Moving on – we take the ninth exit from the roundabout.  (We missed it on the first lap!)  We are heading generally north and west, but we come to an attractive side road off to the right which promises to lead down to the shore.  And there aren’t many of those, at least not lanes I want to take my car down!

It must be instinct because as we hit the beach we found ourselves parked outside a bustling restaurant.  Well, coffee was almost half an hour ago!  There’s one free table for two, so, on an impulse (and with thoughts of not having to cook supper in a big white “air frier” on wheels …) we grabbed it!

There’s a short prom leading from the front door around the top of the beach.  There’s a slip way which seems to stretch a long way.  And there’s a small campsite on the side of the hill.  Almost empty.  Fabulous sea views.  We’ve got the details from the guardian – maybe another time.

Onwards and upwards.  We get back on the coastal road leading to the Spanish Point.  There are the remains of some fairly substantial artillery emplacements.

That’s Brest in the far distance and this battery would have been installed to deter unwanted guests from getting up close and personal with the naval base.

And this Vaubanesk fortification was to stop stray land-based intruders approaching the guns from the rear!

We had another walk on the beach and one quick swim in the sea before we headed off to Roscoff via the “Red Bus” wine store.  We got the last official overnight parking spot and had a jolly evening with a bunch of rally-crazy campers.  In the morning we joined the queue (of mainly camper vans all returning early to avoid the heat wave) for a very full crossing on the Pont Aven.  Our favourite ferry!

Although we look to be near the front of the car-and-caravan queue, we ended up almost at the very back of the boat (Which was actually the front when the ferry got going!)

So, there we have it.  Eight weeks touring a bit of Europe where the temperature ranged from 2 to over 40° C.  We drove a total of 3,252 miles and towed the van 1,416 miles.  Twelve campsites visited, every one new to us.  4326 lunches out!  One fridge door disaster and two new expensive windscreen wipers (new vocab learnt: essui-glaces).  The gas BBQ has been hauled around with us and NOT used for the third succesive caravan tour.  We’ve been in more churches than you can shake a stick at!  Lots of fascinating facts heard, learnt and largely forgotten already!  17 episodes if the blog with a total of 21,540 words written, I’ve just counted them!

And the noisette is the new cappuccino!!!

Now, where are we going next?