Weekend trip to Normandy and Brittany

Last weekend my school took some of us on a 2-day excursion to northern France. It was a beautiful and refreshing escape from the city.

Our first day was spent in Normandie (or Normandy), the province a little north-west of Paris, and just on the French coastline. After a very long bus ride, we finally starting seeing rolling green hills and cute country houses. Our destination was Mont Saint-Michel - a famous abbey located top of a mountain. It was pretty amazing to see the mountain because it literally rises out of nowhere. We were driving along, and suddenly there was a mountain off in the distance! Back when the monks were building the abbey, they leveled the top part of the mountain in order to have the foundation for a church right on top of the peak. So the actual church is at the very top, and below it are rooms and chambers of gothic-style architechture that served various purposes for the religious folk. The rest of the mountain is covered in the overflowing village that spreads down from the abbey. A walled road winds round and round the mountain. In fact, it was this very same mountain-town that inspired the model for the mountain-city in the film version of Lord of the Rings! (I don't remember the name of the city, but I think it was Aragorn's place). Mont Saint-Michel was a pretty amazing place to visit because it looked so old and classic. Our tour guide said that some of the church's rooms are the first versions of gothic architechture that we know of. Also, the views from atop the mountain were beautiful - it felt like we could see all the way to England!

After St-Michel, we drove north to a tiny little seaside town called Granville, where we stayed for the night. Our hostel was located right on top of the shore, and we had a wonderful view of the water from our windows! Granville was a funny little town.. it was so quaint and adorable, and at the same time so empty and quiet! After dinner my friends and I walked around town to check it out, but we soon discovered that "town" is really only a few blocks containing some restaurants, a cafe, an ice cream shop, and a rather lively pizza place. We did find a very old looking church (my non-professional opinion placed it at Romanesque). We also crossed the peninsula and found ourselves on top of a row of cliffs overlooking the sea, right in time for a gorgeous sunset over the water. There were even some steps that took us down to the water.. I found some cool seashells. We walked along the peninsula after the sun set and eventually found an awesome old-fashioned ice cream parlor, with amazing ice cream. Our evening in Granville was pretty relaxing I think.

The next day, we got up bright and early in order to drive to St. Malo, an old walled city in Bretagne. St Malo has lots of history with the English.. it seems everything our tour guide told us was about an attack from the English, or a battle with the English, or a capture by the English... The city itself was interesting though - it is in face completely surrounded by ramparts, which you can walk up to and stroll along. The city is also located directly on the water, which made it an important city for battles. We saw some amazing views from atop the wall, you can see in my pictures. One of the highlights from St Malo was the lunch.. the appetizer was a plate of seafood - but it was crazy! My shrimps still had their heads on.. the oysters looked like they were still alive.. and I had more sea snails than I knew what to do with! (turns out sea snails don't taste that bad, if you can get past the fact that you're eating a sea snail). But the dessert was crème brulée.. it was probably the best dessert I have ever had in my life, I mean that seriously. I'm not going to try to describe it.

The weekend trip was lots of fun, a great way to chill out before coming back to the city and stressing out about the end of semester! It was so nice to see the sea and feel the salt air.. and it was really just a beautiful trip in all. Definitely a fan of northern France.

You can see all of my pictures here:

Weekend in Normandie et Bretagne