Joan and I spent the weekend at Mont St Michel, one of my favourite places in the entire world. We caught a 7 am train from Montparnasse, which meant I had to leave my hostel at like 5.45 am, it was rough, but I could sleep on the train. We had a bus from Rennes to Mont St Michel, which dropped us off right at the base of the island. It was FREEZING and rainy, so first we went to find something warm to drink. And then we had to find me a new umbrella, because I lost mine in the Louvre, what a tragedy. And the umbrella I bought turned out to be useless, as I will get to soon.
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| Mont St Michel in the sunlight |
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| Delicious tarte aux pommes normandes :-) |
We had lunch at a restaurant overlooking the bay, and we splurged on a three course lunch. My dessert was the most delicious thing ever, a tarte aux pommes normandes (an apple tart, but they put apricot purée in it and a crème sauce and it was delicious). After we had filled out tummies, we had the lovely task of finding our inn. It was supposedly 2 km from the island proper, though when we asked for directions, we got distances varying from 1-6 km, so that was promising. And then the wind and rain picked up. We caught a bus into town, stocked up on local delicacies in the supermarché, and started our walk into the countryside. Within two minutes, but umbrella had blown inside out one time too many, and the top of it flew into a ditch. After a miserable walk, we finally found our lovely auberge, after much laughing at ourselves and the universe. It was a lovely, quaint little place, surrounded by sheep fields (the sheep came up and down our street every morning to get to pasture). We settled in, watched some strange German cooking show from the 90s, and had dinner in the auberge's restaurant before having an early night.
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| RIP umbrella :-( |
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| This image accurately depicts our entire adventure to find the auberge |
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| A view of the street of our auberge, it was all quaint country houses in a row! |
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| Getting ready for our adventure in style, and enjoying SUNSHINE! |
Our second day was GORGEOUS, the weather was spectacular. It was about 20 C, sunny, with a slight breeze. We rented bikes from the auberge, and cycled to the island for our guided walk across the baie in the afternoon. Somehow we ended up in the wrong tour group, but it was amazing! Mont St Michel is surrounded by quicksand and crazy tides, so you have to be very careful walking across the baie, but we had a guide who told us all about the natural wonders of the area (in very sarcastic French, so I got about 1/3 of it haha). It was a wonderful way to spend four or five hours of our day, even though I got some nasty sunburn on my neck and shoulders. And next time I won't wear a dress haha (it was either that or jeans, so I clearly planned ahead). We had to cross the tides as they went out, which was quite crazy- we had to link arms so we wouldn't all fall down! The whole walk was quite a workout, but definitely one of my favourite things I've done on my entire trip.
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| Walking into the baie |
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| Our fearless guide showing us quicksand in a very hands-on manner |
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| Crossing the tides to the island in the distance |
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| The view of Mont St Michel from the island |
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| Oh no, stuck in quicksand! (Mum don't worry, you can't actually die because apparently you can't sink past your armpits in this area) |
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| Our sunset bike ride across the baie |
After our excursion, we were famished and found some dinner on the island, before a lovely sunset bike ride back to our auberge. The next day, we had to walk back to town yet again with all our luggage after we checked out, and we spent the morning shopping and exploring the island around the Abbaye- there are so many little paths and gardens hidden around! We caught our bus to Rennes, and then our train back to Paris, where we had a dinner with some wonderful conversations about how study abroad has changed us and what going back to America is going to be like, etc. And then we said farewell, since Joan had classes and work all day when I'd be leaving to return to England.
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| Our neighbours just going for a stroll on through the neighbourhood, nbd |
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| L'Abbaye |
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| Exploring the island, lots of gardens and lookouts to find :-) |
Overall, I adored getting out into the countryside and seeing Mont St Michel again! Definitely one of the best parts of being abroad so far :-)
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