Mont-Saint-Michel - Saturday 5/5/2007

It was amazing driving up to this place through meadows. You can see it for about 20 minutes before you get to the causeway. It's still a very impressive and inspirational place...it must have given pilgrims a lot to think about as they approached it for hours on foot.

Mont-Saint-Michel's story began around the year 709 with a vision from Saint Michael, requesting a shrine be built in his honor. But I'll let you check out the history for yourself if you're interested.



We had been warned that our hotel--which is up about three levels from the wall--would give away our reservations if we weren't there by 5pm. We arrived at the parking lot at 5pm, and needed to walk into the village from, yes, about where this photo was taken! We stuffed pyjamas and a change of essential clothes into backpacks and hiked into the town. Dodging tourists, we arrived at the reception desk at about 5:20 where they said, "But of course, we'd save the room." Ahem.


Photo by Hydra of Mom and I at the archway that leads to the passage from the main street to our hotel room. There are just so many photos I'd like to include, but I can't. The room was in the hotel's annex, right below a cemetery. I guess only about 30 people live on the island full time. And, um, about 50 people seem to be dead on the island all the time.



We all explored for a while and then had dinner, including a bottle of the local hard cider. We asked if they sold the cups that the cider was served in, and the waiter stood back, opened his arms in a Gallic shrug and said, "No... But I see nothing!"

Mom, possibly done in by the cidre, went back to the room. Hydra and I continued to poke around all the levels. We stood a little below here and watched the famous tides come rushing in about about 12 mph! We watched a sandbar disappear in a few minutes, with a gull standing on it until the last possible second.


Looking back toward shore. Before the causeway, this became an island every high tide. They're engineering a new bridge and will take out the causeway, which has caused parts of the bay to silt up during the 100+ years it's been there.

We'd arrived too late to actually get into the famous cathedral at the top, but we enjoyed walking around the passages and being able to look down on the main street, and to see the whole thing from a new perspective every few steps.



Mom took this photo of me tucked into a narrow stairway between shops on the main passageway (actually on our way out in the morning). Hydra was buying a reproduction of a section of the Bayaux Tapestry that is now hanging above our fireplace!

Right after this was taken, a woman excused herself and used this stairway to take linens up to one of the rooms above!

If you make the effort to go to Mont-Saint-Michel I would highly recommend staying the night on the island. The daytrippers were gone by the time we settled into our rooms, and it felt like we almost had the place to ourselves in the evening and early morning.