Stone Me

There's something 'old' about Brittany, and I've not stumbled into yoofspeak and it's like so old innit grandad. I mean there's something truly ancient about Brittany, as today we headed to Carnac, and the Megalithes. Think of Obelix carrying his giant rock, the multiply by a few thousand. The rocks that is. Not Obelix. The Romans wouldn't have stood a chance with thousands of Obelixes around, and it would have had to be a giant pot for him them all to fall into as children...

But the morning was taken up with more modern pursuits, with some surf-watching on the Quiberon peninsula. While the Pointe du Raz and so on were a bit disappointing on first view, Quiberon really does have something going for it. Wonderful rocks, great beaches, and, of course, some fab surf. In the high season it can get somewhat crowded, whereas in the just-off-season the greatest crowds are caused by surfers, who were all out in the water rather than taking up space on the one and only road onto the peninsula.

That's not to say we got away scott-free on the traffic, as we headed to Carnac, and got trapped in a ridiculous jam caused by a food market closing down a couple of roads, and the French bloody-mindedness of 'well yes, I know the road is closed, but surely I can go down there' leading to every second driver stopping to speak to the policeman directing traffic, while others strip themselves of common sense to block up all roundabouts in a half-mile radius so adding to the gridlockness. But once through we were able to take in the alignements of standing stones which have stood since long before the days of Christ.

It's impressive in scale (there are three main groupings: Kerlescan has 555 stones, Kermario and Ménec with over 1,000 each), but it has to be said, after experiencing the Callanish Stones earlier in the year, with their more isolated feel, and, naturally, less people, there was just that certain 'je ne sais quoi' from the Carnac versions. I don't know what it was.

To underline the history of the area we then had a wander round the old port of nearby Auray where, in the 1770s, Benjamin Franklin landed to try and drum up support for America's independence from Britain. And everything is named after Franklin to underline the fact. It's an interesting juxtaposition that one of the earliest memories of the USA is situated in a place in Europe which has its own memories stretching back thousands more.