We headed for the backroads of Brittany in early April with dangerously high expectations of catching a salmon. Traveling off the beaten track is has always appealed to us. Early on we carried backpacks into the wilderness; these days we travel by car and sleep indoors. As always, in anticipation of eating locally.
Our destination in southern Finistere was a picturesque stone cottage we rented on the idyllic Aulne River near Quimper. However, it was quickly apparent that a rainy spring season had left the water a bit too turbulent for good fishing. The resident river otter appeared to be the only one having any luck.
On to Plan B: two days driving along Finistere’s rugged coastline, walking its picturesque port towns and sampling a few creperies:
Creperie Tulan in Douarnenez was packed when we arrived at lunchtime on a rainy Tuesday. The owner welcomed us by quickly clearing the last small table. George ordered the house specialty, a buckwheat crepe filled with plump marinated sardines. Why sardines, you ask? Until stocks dwindled in the late 1970‘s, more sardines were processed and canned in Douarnenez than anywhere in Europe. We stocked up before leaving town.
My favorite crepe was filled with house-made bitter orange marmalade, topped with a scoop of spice cake ice cream and flamed with Grand Marnier. It was one of the imaginative offerings at La Krampouserie, Breton for creperie, in the charming town of Quimper. (Street and town signs are in French and Breton throughout Brittany, a sign of this region’s fidelity to its Celtic British roots
In late afternoon we stopped along the beach on Presqu’Isle de Crozon to watch an exceptionally high tide roll in. I crouched in the grass with my camera hoping to capture the emotional effect created by the pounding rhythm of rolling waves against the sandy shore.
The following day we ventured over to the very western tip of Brittany - Pointe de Raz on La Cornouaille peninsula. Weather-challenged yet again, we made our way to land’s end, bending into thirty mile hour winds in a steady rainfall over a wet stone walkway. Rising out of the fog near the edge is a commanding sculpture of the Virgin Mary holding a baby Jesus who reaches out to a shipwrecked sailor below. It’s a chilling memorial to the many sailors who failed to make land along Brittany’s treacherous coastline.
As we headed east from Pointe de Raz, in the first small town we passed, a supermarket welcomed us with this sign: “the last supermarket stop between here and America”. Of course we went in....
