The last day of our little holiday.

We drove to Josselin to have an explore and climbed up the church tower there.  We then drove into Rennes and after some sandwiches we’d made.

We explored the Lignes Grande Vitesse exhibition at the Espace-Sciences museum.
Then we drove to Caen and did the holiday shop topping up on nice wine, cheese, meat, sausages etc.

Finally we drove to Ouistreham ready for our ferry home.  We had dinner in a not-very-good restaurant then had a good sleep on the crossing on the way back ready for an early arrival at Portsmouth on the Saturday.

Lac de Guerledan and a slap-up evening meal

Today we decided to do a tour of the Lac de Guerledan.  We started with a coffee at Mur de Bretagne and then drove around a few stops on the way. These included Baux Rivage, Tregnanton, Ecluse de Bellvue, Bon Repos, and Anse de Sordan.

We had some nice bread, cheese, and rilletes from the market yesterday for lunch at our stop at Ecluse de Bellvue. We explored the Abbaye de Bon Repos while we were there and enjoyed a particularly good audio-visual guide provided on a tablet.  All the sites around the lake looked like they would be very busy in the summer but were pleasantly quiet at this time of the year.

After leaving the lake we drove to Pontivy for a little explore and had a wander around the castle there, Chateau de Rohan, and bought some bread for tomorrow.  We drove back into Melrand where there was a very little market (3 stalls!) and then came back to the apartment for a rest.

Our evening meal was at L’Auberge de la Tourelle which has not been open until today.  It’s definitely not high season here!  The meal was excellent.

A market in Lorient, a walk and some Crêpes

Today was market day in Lorient so we went to visit both the indoor and outdoor markets.  There was lots of good produce, dairy products, meat and fish and we bought quite a few things including some delicious brochettes (skewer kebabs).

We brought these back to our apartment and cooked them for some lunch with some delicious local asparagus, also bought in the markets.

In the afternoon we did a walk around Melrand and surrounding areas.  The weather was great and the scenery very lovely.  The walk was very well marked out so we didn’t get lost at all.

We walked back into Melrand and enjoyed some pancakes from the creperie, first a savoury and then a sweet one, washed down with some good dark local beer made of buckwheat.  We went to a local bar for a couple more beers before making our way back to the apartment and having a good fire in the woodburner there.

Belle Ile

We got up early today to get to Quiberon to get a little ferry to Belle Ile.  The crossing took about 45 minutes and we arrived a bit before noon.

We hired some amazing electric bikes and probably cycled about 25 km around the island. Visits included the Citadel, a really good lunch at Le Parenthese, then cycling to Bangor then Port Coton and to Sauzon.  We went on to Pointe des Poulains.

We got back to Le Palais, the port town, just in time to return the bikes and get a ferry back to Quiberon.  We drove back to Melrand and had beer and snacks there before a reasonably early night.

Arriving at St Malo, Rennes and onto the Gite

We had a bright and early start ready for 8.15am French time leaving the ferry at St Malo.  We managed to find some coffee and pains au chocolat on the ferry before we left.

We drove then into Rennes and spent some time exploring it including visiting the cathedral, the tourist office the town hall, the opera, the Breton Parliament and Parc du Thabor.  We had a light lunch of tartines and then drove to Melrand to find our accommodation for the holiday, Le Grenier. We arrived about 3.30pm and found it to be pleasant.

In the evening we walked into Melrand (about 10 minutes) and had a few beers in the local bar followed by a pizza from the takeaway there (nothing else open as it was a bank holiday like in the UK) that we ate in the pleasant square.

A short trip to Brittany

We left Oxfordshire in the afternoon for an 8.15pm Ferry from Portsmouth.  We sailed on the Bretagne and enjoyed Caramel pork for supper, a couple of beers and some bad entertainment in the bar then had a good night’s sleep in our cabin.