Wednesday, September 18, 2019

Le Mont Saint Michel in Normandy France is a must. Well kind of.

Le Mont Saint Michel today. A world heritage listed tourist trap if ever there was one. But read on dear traveller as there was a happy ending to this story from my travel diary.
  Pricey food, souvenir shops full of mostly crap and sooooooo many people. I usually avoid these places like the plague, but when in Normandy it’s kind of a must.  The kids bitched all the way on the 1.5 hour drive too, which didn’t help.  

It’s a big climb to the top, which my hips loved.  Despite not really showing any improvement aesthetically. So was our pilgrimage worth it?  Well yes actually, the day was saved by a gorgeous French guide, included in the tariff, and whom we were lucky enough to encounter just before she began.  There are only 2 tours in English the whole day.  She made the whole story come alive and she was delightful, quite charming and very feminine.    Apparently, the abbey featured big time in the hundred year wars.  The Brits had settled all around the island making life difficult, but it was the last bastion of France and they (the Brits) were never able to invade it.  So it’s an important French symbol of liberte,  egalite and fraternite, as they like to say.  The abbey’s very bear inside because it was trashed during the revolution.  You kind of go in and the layers are peeled down until you find yourself in the crypt and touching the rock The Abbey was built on.  Apparently touching the rock is lucky.  Suffice to say I was not the only one who touched it more than once.


The endless crowds in this World Heritage Listed icon

On the bus in from the carpark



Those sheep and their offspring eat the salt-tolerant grass and it gives the lamb a beautiful highly sought after quality


The cloisters


The top of the Abbey from the bottom

Surrounded by water making this the last bastion of French territory during the 100-year wars.  That's why it is so iconic in France.

The Cloisters

Armour for sale



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