One of the places I have been told many times is worth the visit is Mont St. Michel.
Through some clever train searching, some friends found a good deal for a few of us to go there as a group, so Sarah, Becca and I went over a weekend.
We arrived in a small town called Pontorson. The hostel we had booked had a free pickup shuttle service, and you can definitely understand why since their location seemed to be in the middle of nowhere. The couple that ran the inn were from England, and they seemed to have relocated after retirement to open a little bed and breakfast in an area they loved. They had brought over a red minibus with the steering wheel on the opposite side of the car, and it was quite interesting riding in it, especially when the inn owner was trying to pass cars. He had to rely on his wife in the passenger seat to tell him if the coast was clear! Most of their customers are visitors to Mont Saint Michel, and they did a wonderful job in the organization for their guests. As long as you told them when you were arriving or when you wanted to go to the Mont, they were happy to give you a lift. We rode back in the shuttle with a few other guests that were arriving on the same train and checked in. The room was simple, but it was all we really needed for one night – bathroom, full sized bed, and a bunk bed.
Since we arrived a little bit before dinner time, we went out walking and wandered around the area on our way up to one of the restaurants that had been recommended by the inn owners. There was a little ‘town’ area right around the inn that consisted of approximately 4 buildings and lots of farm land. In the direction of the restaurant we just walked uphill along a country road. We were more or less the first customers of the evening at the crêperie, and it was absolutely delicious. The caramelized apple crêpe I had for desert was magnificent: a perfect blend of salty and sweet and the apples were cooked to perfection. While we were eating, the other guests from the inn showed up (two backpackers from America, and one other girl just traveling around).
We left before them and walked around the area near the crêperie. The restaurant was called La Télégraphe after an old telegraph station right next to it. I haven’t done the research, but the inn owners told us that it was used during WWII and is one of the oldest telegraphs in France.
We also came upon a goat in the middle of what looked like grass that had gotten too high. He was eating nonstop, and I think he was probably being used as a lawnmower!
As we started to make our way back to the inn, we again met up with the other guests. We walked back with them, and even wandered down another side road on the way back that included a larger residential area, and English pub, a pottery store, and other random businesses. The area seemed to have a heavy English influence – it’s more than likely a big area to have vacation homes or a place where a lot of people go after retirement. I also stumbled across what looked like ruins built into the side of a hill. It’s astounding to come across ruins, and it always makes me remember the history of an area and wonder if it was just a building that had been knocked down or if there used to be a huge fortress there.
The next morning we had the breakfast offered by the inn, and the girl that was traveling alone sat down with us. Talking to her, it turned out that she was from America (Texas – but not originally based on her accent, though she never told us where else she was from), and she seemed to be bad talking Americans the entire time. According to her, they’re all rude, unsophisticated, overweight, they know nothing, blah blah blah, she didn’t like Obama, and it was just getting a little annoying. Everyone is entitled to his or her own opinion, but she was just rubbing me the wrong way. We finished breakfast, and went to grab our stuff to take with us to the Mont since we would be going directly to the train. Originally we had thought about renting bikes from the inn, but they were all booked by the time we asked, so we rode the shuttle instead. Annoying Girl also took the shuttle with us, and she never seemed to be quiet. As we waited for the owner to pull the shuttle around, I came across the kittens the owners had recently acquired. They were so cute, and I enjoyed playing with them!
We were dropped off a little ways from the Mont and stopped to take pictures before we walked the entire way. Once we got through the city gates we tried our best to separate from Annoying Girl. She was asking us about bus times, which obviously we wouldn’t know either, and we directed her to the Tourism Office at the entrance to the city, but she didn’t go in. We had also been told that there was a hotel that would hold our bags for us, so we told her to go on without us while Sarah went to an ATM, but she waited for us. When we got to the hotel, the receptionist negotiated a price on holding our bags, and it seemed very sketchy. I took anything of value from mine since it was just going to be left in a corner of the lobby. I don’t recall exactly how it happened, but I know that the receptionist had spoken some English and we switched over to French, and Annoying Girl went up to the receptionist, got frustrated, and looked at us and asked if we could ask something about the busses. Anyway, I looked at her and replied that the receptionist spoke English, and she doesn’t have to ask through us. Again, she was told that the Tourism Office was the place to go, and finally that is where our paths parted. We ran into her a couple of times later in the day, but I was very happy to not spend the day with her.
It was still early in the day when we left the hotel after dropping off our bags. The inn owners had also advised us to go directly to the abbey since it wouldn’t be as busy when we arrived. So up the hill we went. And up. And up. But it wasn’t so bad since HEC is on top of a mountain, haha. Oh, and I had a surprise Joan sighting!
We walked all the way through the abbey, seeing amazing sights that stretched for miles. From the top, you could see the bay and see the sand that stretched out to meet the water. Sarah said that she had read that when tide comes in the water rises so fast it would knock down a galloping horse. We continued to make our way through the entire abbey, seeing spactacular views and trying to figure out what all of the old machinery had been used for in the past. Finally, we came to the end, which, like most places, was the gift shop. The only problem was that Sarah had wanted to attend mass, and we couldn’t really go backwards through the abbey. So we started at the front again, explained that our tickets were already punched and that we just wanted to go back for mass, and we went. Becca and I only stayed for a little bit of the mass, preferring to go out again and explore a little bit more.
We walked all the way through the abbey again, and this time stopped in a garden area for a little bit before we continued on. As we made our way back into the city like atmosphere it was apparent that the masses of tourists had arrived. It felt like we were the only ones walking down through the narrow streets, and everyone else was walking up. It was a bit like trying to swim against the tide. We stopped off at a few little gift shops and perused the menus available at the restaurants. There was a very specific trend showing up: every place was serving mussels. Moules marinières, moules frites – you name it they were serving it. Since everyplace was basically identical, the only option was to try to find the place with the best lunch menu, or the cheapest. When Sarah came to join us we chose a place with a view and sat down to eat.
After lunch we went outside of the city and decided to walk around the mont. We had to be careful about where we stepped as the sand could be pliable enough to walk on or your feet would just sink down and your feet would be covered. I picked up a little bit of the sand and found that it had a very clay-like quality, which I suppose aided to its quicksand ability. As we were walking, we saw several groups going out to walk the distance to the other side of the bay, and we also found plenty of places that we would not have otherwise seen.
Since I definitely like to be on time (and the hotel owner told us to take the bus before the one we would need to catch our train), we got onto the bus to take us back to Pontorson. Of course there was no traffic, so we made it in fine time and still had a while before our train would come. We attempted to change our tickets to the earlier train to no avail, so we set out walking. Sarah found a book that she had been debating about buying, and so she decided to purchase it. We also got some goodies from a boulangerie-patisserie to eat later for dinner. I purchased a chicken quiche, which was both something that I had never really considered, and was delicious.
We made it back to Jouy safely, after an hour stop off at a little place called Foligny that looked like it had nothing, and continued on in our weekly routines.
