France Fri - Sun 12-14.11.10

Dad and I went off for our traditional annual weekend in France. We took our usual ferry, which, it has to be said, looks really inviting.

Our new breakfast cafe had a bloke at the bar who looked rather too much like dad for my liking - 

STEREO FOR THE EYES

It was pouring with rain. Now tell me, what do you do with an 87 year old man on a wet day in France???

No, not  
FOR WHOM THE BELL TOLLS!

YOU GO FOR A BLOODY LONG DRIVE.

We headed for BREST and the 

FINISTERE coast, 

and its' LIGHTHOUSES .

Yes this is a fascinating and rather weird place. I'll definitely be back.

Such an emotive area, and yet dad and I had never been here over all the years we have been travelling to Brittany.

Good surf today,

with a surfer to match. I wanted my board too. 

I WILL BE BACK.....

The  ROCKS are a hazard though!

But those lighthouses are EVERY WHERE:

they'll save us!

Well most of us.

Plenty more to enjoy here, 

other than rocks.

Oh yes, I see, there are more rocks in the back ground.

I really like the unlikely contrast of the architecture here!

This is where these pictures were from - I highly recommend the area. 

We moved inland and found this GARGOYLE and its' coating of LICHEN.

and along the same street this VERY FRENCH SCENE - gorgeous to me, every day, boring, to the French locals.

I spotted these trawlermen  as they were hanging onto  the back of a heavily laden lorry, as we went through  CONQUET to find the LOCAL  lighthouse (it isn't called the lighthouse trail with out good reason - 4 euros buys you access to 3 lighthouses and their museums ... BARGAIN) and, on seeing them, I said to dad, ' we're go'na follow those fishermen, cos they're head'n fer t'sea,' and they were.

So here we were on the quay side of a small cooperative fishing port - one of my favourite haunts (water, water, water) and totally inspiring.

Sooooooo Beautiful

Something that always scared me when I was diving, drift netting, is SSSOOOOOO BEAUTIFUL when out of the water. Now, that's hard to believe!

If dad hadn't been waiting for me and soaking up the atmosphere; I'd have been happy to spend the rest of the day here.

Even the houses here are fishing orientated.

We headed out of town 

towards a 9 metre ( 31ft ) STANDING STONE (see St. Renan - tourist info). 

we saw lots of beautiful things on the way,

some of them were PERFECTLY FRENCH,

but no standing stone. As dad said, ' Face it, you're out of luck, you're not going to see it. 'Yes, OK, genius, but how can we miss some thing that size in such a small town?????? 

I'LL BE BACK.

With MeWally


(Oh yeh, that car. We had one when we (MeWally and I) were very young. I was still a teenager - probably- and the car was red with string holding the seats in place. AND I LOVED IT).  MeWally says ours wasn't a string seat one....but I beg to differ : )

In BREST we were blown away  by these STARLINGS  coming home to roost. I was there for over an hour snapping and watching. Even dad was out of the car and snapping too. The sound of the screaming birds and the chiming of the church bells, combined with my whole whole field of view being filled with birds, was overwhelming and all consuming. 


A FEAST FOR THE SENSES


 For more views of these birds see Muddy Boots or Muddy Wild, Yes, and just like my dad, I also took a fair few shots!


After all that snapping, we needed to head towards the ferry and, for dad, a lager!

Dad, "Where's my BEER?

"Ahh, here it is coming in to land,"

Yee-ummmm.

I think he liked that!

We went back to the boat

 and here is the interior!

Even these LIFTS are Pretty swish for a mere ferry. Nice one BRITTANY FERRIES!

Our usual, seafront restaurant/hotel was closed tonight, as it has gone the end of October (sob), so we ate on the ship... which turned out to be -


NOT SO BAD! 


Like to share the tail end of our meal tonight?  Just look at that 

FRENCH TART!