May the Light Shine Upon You

 

While in Dinan we visited the Église Saint-Malo, a 15th century Catholic church, a little bit "younger" than the medieval town center with its buildings from the the 13th and 14th century.

From outside, the church looks like a typical Gothic building, but pay attention to the big windows.

Inside, the church is without the ornaments we often associate with Catholic churches. The nave is high and light.

I loved the aisles - I often find them more interesting than the nave.

But what makes this church "alive" is the windows, or to be more precise the light that comes in through them, lighting up the walls.

The true fascination, though, is caused by the stained glass windows. Look at that!

As a photographer I am always fascinated by light, but when light, glass and color meet, it's amazing.

Light, color and shadow on the stone floor.

Do you see the people's faces in the stained glass? This is my contribution to Nicole's Friday Face Off. I guess this depicts the scene of Jesus and the children, "Let the children come to me" - I'm not particularly well versed in the Bible, but this I remember from confirmation classes in my teenage years.

Have an enjoyable weekend, everybody!

Strolling Along Old Streets

 

Bienvenue à Dinan, a medieval town in Bretagne. We were immediately drawn in by the cobblestone streets and half timbered houses. It is a lively little town where the streets are busy with people shopping in small local shops and sitting in street cafés. 

One of our favorite places was Place des Merciers.

Look at these old buildings! Some of these timber framed houses date from the 13th century and look as if they're leaning toward each other. 

We enjoyed strolling along the cobblestone alleys, passageways and streets (all pedestrian zone), visiting some shops and just enjoying the bustling atmosphere of this old city. I take delight in walking in towns without the need of watching out for cars. Many European towns and cities are so enjoyable because pedestrians don't take a back seat to cars. Instead, they are walkable and inviting with local shops, restaurants and cafés.

Outdoor restaurants and cafes were waiting for the lunch crowd.

The porch of the Couvent des Cordeliers, a monastery that was established by the Franciscans or Cordeliers in 1241. The construction of the Gothic porch itself was commenced in the 15th century. The monastery was closed in 1791 during the French Revolution and subsequently declared state property. Today, all that remains of the monastery is the cloister, courtyard and the Gothic porch.

Some more of the narrow alleys.

A gourmet shop. If you look closely you can see some bottles in the shop window. This is for Bleubeard and Elizabeth's T Tuesday.

A notable landmark is the Tour de l'Horloge (clock tower) with its height of 40 meters (about 130 feet). It was commissioned by Queen Anne de Bretagne and housed the Maison de la Ville (town hall) until the French Revolution. Unfortunately, the tower was closed and we weren't able to climb up to the platform.

I'm not sure whether the lights in the streets were already up for Christmas or whether they are permanent decoration. We didn't stay until the evening to find out what it looks like, but my guess is that it's very beautiful and atmospheric, almost romantic.

Rain's prompt for TADD this week is "city streets" - I think this post fits the topic.

Washing Oysters

 

After spending the night in Pontorson, we went to Cancale to find a boulangerie to get some breakfast. Cancale is a small fishing port about fifteen kilometers east of Saint-Malo. It has a reputation of being the "oyster capital" of Bretagne (Brittany). We first went to the cliffs from where we could have seen the oyster farms at low tide if there hadn't been any fog. However, it was foggy and we only saw this:

Arriving at the center square, we were drawn to the fountain in front of the church Saint-Méen, dedicated to a Breton monk who is said to have founded Cancale in the 6th century. Les Laveuses d'Huitres (the oyster washers) is a bronze statue by the sculptor Jean Fréour which pays tribute to the women of Cancale who washed oysters at the beginning of the 20 th century before mechanization.

It must have been a hard job.

It was October when we were in Cancale and the two women are wearing pink in support of Pink October to symbolize breast cancer awareness.

The faces of the women are for Nicole's Friday Face Off. Please note the spider web.

On a completely different note - this mountain will always be Denali for me.

Photo taken at midnight from Wonder Lake campground in July 2005.

The Island of Stairs

 

We're back in France, in Normandie. After we had visited Honfleur, we had a bit of a longer drive until we reached that day's destination: Mont Saint-Michel. I'm pretty sure everyone has heard of it or seen pictures of it. It's one of the most visited cultural sites in France and since 1979 it has been a UNESCO World Heritage Site. 

It was the spring of 1976 that I first visited it. At that time, Mont Saint-Michel was only accessible during low tide. There was a causeway leading to the island, and if you forgot about the time, you could be stuck on the island if the water had covered the causeway. Because of environmental reasons the causeway now has been removed and replaced by a long bridge that you can either cross by shuttle or on foot.

A huge parking lot has been built about 2.5 km (1.5 mi) away from the island. From here you have a first view of the Mont.

There were a lot of people waiting for the shuttle, therefore we opted to walk the 2.5 km. I'm glad that we did. It takes about 35-40 minutes to walk from the parking lot and it's nice to see the Mont getting closer and closer.

The big walls below...

... and the abbey on top.

We were greeted by a very vocal gull.

Let's go in, shall we?

After getting through the first two gates, you find yourself in the narrow alley, and you're certainly not alone.

We climbed up to the wall and got a first impression of the Mont. Little towers with intersting roofs, beautiful windows...

... and a foretaste of what was to come - stairs. Lots of them.

It's also an island of old doors, and since I love doors I took way too many pictures of them.

So let's climb those stairs, but take it slow.

No matter how many stairs you climb, the abbey is always looming over you. Does it every get closer?

The gulls have it a lot easier to get up.

But at least there are always little nooks to discover. It certainly isn't boring here, and since you have to stop and catch your breath, you have ample time to take in the sights.

More stairs, up to the abbey now - or so we thought. The is the Grand Degré staircase with the church on the right and the abbey's living quarters on the left.

Still not there! But close.

Finally we found ourselves at the West Terrace in front of the entrance to the abbey. I stopped to look around and really enjoyed what the shadow of the abbey looked like on the flats.

Then we entered the abbey church. Work on the church began in 1023, built on the rock (that is the Mont) and rests partially on four crypts built into the slope. There was a mass going on when we stepped in, and the beautiful singing gave the room a very special atmosphere.

I liked the "plainness" of the church.

The part I usually like best about abbeys is the cloister. This one was no exception. Yes, that is Kaefer on the other side.

From the cloister you get into the refectory where the Benedictine monks ate their meals in silence while one of them read from the pulpit. Here I especially like the beautiful windows. Aren't they gorgeous?

And we're still not done with the stairs!

Now we're in the Salle des Hôtes which was used for hosting kings and noblemen. The shadows that the windows created fascinated me (the left one is in the Salle des Hôtes, the right one in the abbey church).

Another part of churches I like is the crypt. As mentioned above, Mont Saint-Michel Abbey has four crypts and I certainly loved the Crypte des gros piliers (Crypt of the Great pillars) including the creative way of getting light and air inside.

These windows are not particularly spectacular, but I loved the old vaults.

More stairs...

The Scriptorium was probably my favorite room (this is not the entire room).

And still more stairs... I think I reached my annual stair-climbing quota.

Then it was time to leave. This time we took the shuttle because we were all a bit exhausted. Au revoir, le mont!

We stayed the night in nearby Pontorson where we had found an entire vacation home. In the evening we went to the small Crêperie du Couesnon - it only has about six tables. Thankfully we were early, because not even 30 minutes after we had arrived, the sign "complet" (full) was put in the door. The food was wonderful - crêpes are the sweet ones and galletes are the savory one, usually made with buckwheat. I first had a galette with ham, mushrooms, egg and cheese followed by a crêpe flambée. Both were so delicious - the Geek and Kaefer were very happy with their choices as well. You can also see our glasses of water in the picture, they are my ticket to Bleubeard and Elizabeth's T Tuesday.

Hopefully after reading this long post you are not quite as exhausted as I was after climbing all those stairs!