A Dark History Amidst Rough Beauty

 

After our protest march, let's go back to Brittany - and part of this post will kind of pick up on my last post. You will make the connection.

Here we are on the Crozon peninsula, South of Brest. We first visited this circle of menhirs, the Alignements de Lagatjar. Just like all the other menhirs we had seen so far, they were close to the road, on open land. Most of them are aligned into three lines, but there are also some "solitary" ones.

There are about 60 to 70 stones still standing here and they are thought to date to 2,500 BC. No wonder there was a lot of lichen to be found on them.

The menhirs sit atop the Plage de Pen Hat which is surrounded by rather rough cliffs. This area is called Pen Hir.

The weather was pretty miserable, chilly and foggy and there was a constant drizzle. Nevertheless, we decided to walk along the cliffs for a bit. In good weather the view is said to be fantastic from here.

Very soon we came upon disturbing buildings that were telling of a very dark history.

These are fortifications originally built by the French navy in 1889. After the German invasion in 1940, the area was taken over by the German navy and in 1942 they started the construction of a gun battery to defend the Southern entrance to the U-boat base in Brest.

 These bunkers and batteries were part of the Atlantikwall (Atlantic Wall) - a massive system of coastal fortifications built by Nazi Germany between 1942 and 1944 along the European coastline from Norway to Spain. Its primary purpose was to deter an Allied invasion from the West, particularly from Great Britain. However, the Atlantikwall was never fully completed by the time the Allied invasion of Normandy (D-Day) began in 1944.

The remains of the fortifications are open to the public and you can freely walk around here. Seeing these hideous bunkers made me extremely uncomfortable; I walked around with a big knot in my stomach. As a German who is aware of her native country's history this just makes me sick. The grey day reinforced these feelings. We were at this place a week before the US elections and I bet that the anxiety before that contributed to my uneasiness as well. (Since then, my uneasiness has grown a lot, but also my anger and frustration).

But even at this dire place some beauty could be found:

We continued walking along the rough path along the cliffs, up to the "cross" in the distance.

I noticed a lot of snails by the side of the trail.

Finally we had reached the "cross", the Monument to the Bretons of Free France. The inscription translates to

"To the Bretons of Free France - MCMXL-MCMXLV - France has lost a battle, but France has not lost the war. In the free world immense forces have not yet given up. One day these forces will crash the enemy."

Looking around, there was so much rough beauty.

And of course so close to the ocean there were gulls. They weren't shy at all. Does this sweet face count for Nicole's Friday Face Off?

That day we drove to Pont Aven, an idyllic town known for its artists colony, no doubt the most famous among them Paul Gauguin.

We stayed for the night in a beautiful little appartment and went to a crêperie for dinner. As usual, the food was delicious. A good ending to a day of very mixed emotions.