TRAVELS (and more) WITH CECILIA BRAINARD: Travel France: Coast of Brittany St. Malo, Roscoff, Finistere, Pt. Matthieu

Thursday, May 21, 2015

Travel France: Coast of Brittany St. Malo, Roscoff, Finistere, Pt. Matthieu

From Mont Saint-Michel, we continued our journey west to the coast of Brittany, which is in the north-west section of France.

Brittany feels like another place. The wild crashing sea is there, and the tides change dramatically. I saw farms of artichokes and other vegetables. There are also cows and sheep. But I suspect it is the sea that has defined the people.

(The Bretons are a separate ethnic group; they are Celtic like the Irish, Welsh, Scots, Cornish, and Manx peoples -- more on this next time.)

We are in the city of Quemper, the capital of Finistere, and we will be learning more about the people and their culture.

So for now, let me share some pictures taken in north-west Brittany.

The picture of Lauren and me was taken in the ramparts of Intra Muros in St. Malo. (Manila has a walled city called Intramuros as well!).

The four successive pictures demonstrate the great difference in tides here. When it is low tide, the boats are resting on the sea floor. When the tide is in, the boats rise twenty feet or higher. (Tides are affected by the sun, moon, and the geography of the place. Areas with large land mass do not have great tidal fluctuations.)

I'm sharing other pictures taken as we did our coastal tour: a Celtic megalith, lighthouse, and St. Matthieu's point with a lighthouse and ruins of an abbey.

Stay tuned for more about our French trip.

Normandy Beaches and World War II

Bayeux Tapestry, Cathedral, Norman-Saxon History

Dog in a Restaurant - Bistro des Artistes, Honfleur, France

Pilgrimage to Therese of Lisieux Sites

Rain in Rouen and Sunshine in Honfleur
Coming Up Normandy, Brittany, and Paris, France
My Love Affair with France
Tags: Brittany, Saint Malo, Intramuros, France, Europe, travel, tourism, holiday
This is all for now,
Cecilia

Cecilia Manguerra Brainard

Cecilia Manguerra Brainard's official website is ceciliabrainarddotcom. She is the award-winning author and editor of 22 books, including When the Rainbow Goddess Wept, The Newspaper Widow, Magdalena, Selected Stories, Vigan and Other Stories, and more. She edited Growing Up Filipino 1, 2, & 3, Fiction by Filipinos in America, Contemporary Fiction by Filipinos in America, and other books.. Her work has been translated into Finnish and Turkish; and many of her stories and articles have been widely anthologized. Cecilia has received many awards, including a California Arts Council Fellowship in Fiction, a Brody Arts Fund Award, a Special Recognition Award for her work dealing with Asian American youths, as well as a Certificate of Recognition from the California State Senate, 21st District, and the Outstanding Individual Award from her birth city, Cebu, Philippines. She has lectured and performed at UCLA, USC, University of Connecticut, University of the Philippines, PEN, Shakespeare & Company in Paris, and many others. She has served in the Board of literary arts groups such as PEN, PAWWA (Pacific Asian American Writers West), among others.