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By the time Brian arrived, Thursday was pretty well gone with just enough time to go and enjoy a sunset over the English Channel. So that is what we did. Playing in the tide pools and climbing rocky cliffs made a nice preamble to a beautiful sunset.
No vacation in Europe would be complete without a half-timbered building or two. Dinan has an entire half-timbered city center that is a pedestrian and shopping area. Even in the rain, it was a pleasure to wander through the streets, window shop, and enjoy an ice cream.
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Brittany is about the sea. Fortified coastal cities. Tall ships. Beaches. Music. These are all celebrated during the summer in various ways. On Saturday we had the chance to experience a few of these. In the town of Landerneau there was a festival with live Celtic music, traditional dress, and fresh seafood for everyone. From there we went to Brest to see tall ships from around the world and one of the largest aquariums in Europe. Dinner at the docks and a tour of a Russian tall ship were a nice way to end the day.
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For our last day, we started in the town of Quimper. Quimper is famous for their fine pottery with traditional hand painted decorations. The background of these pages is an example. As you might well imagine, the shops in town are good sources of the local product with shop windows filled with bright colors and tempting decorations. Too tempting in fact. After exploring a couple of shops quite deeply, we moved on to Concarneau.
Concarneau is a walled city that sits on the edge of the Altantic, protecting the port. The city center is a medieval maze that was in full festival mode with musicians in several different squares. We danced our way from one end of the city to the other, stopping only to enjoy our last galette of the trip.
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Juli and Perri sum up the week the best--good exhausting fun. We all had such a good time exploring this very special part of France that we are looking forward to going back again soon.
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