MEDIEVAL TOWN OF DINAN

Friday, April 24, 2009 (picture is of the nice B&B book Lady)
Today’s plan is to tour the city of Dinan….. arrived at 9:45 AM and starting looking for the free parking lot as listed in our Rick Steves book. Found the parking but after visiting the Visitor Center up the street we realized that we were in the wrong park and would need to purchase a parking ticket…. But since we had a good spot we just bought the ticket and left the car where it was. As we strolled down the cobblestone streets of old medieval Dinan, just past the Clock Tower we turned onto the very ancienne rue de Dinan street of Du Jerzual. This street was a continuous downhill cobblestone walk that eventually led us down to the Port of Dinan. Along the way I mentioned to Martha that we should try to trade our English novels in one of the B & B’s in this area. We had both finished our books last night and had brought them with us just in case found someone to trade with…… she said “go ahead and try it” So we opened the gates and climbed the stairway to Le Logis du Jerzual, a beautiful small B&B. The lady of the house spoke limited English but when I took my book out of my backpack she soon realized what we wanted to do and led us upstairs to a bookcase in one of her rooms. How lucky could we get….. she had at least a dozen English language novels for us to choose from. We each found one to take and I was kept looking at a third book by Barbara Taylor Bradford so she encouraged me to take that one also.. We exchanged business cards, took a picture and said that we would include her in our blog.

Continuing on our walk, enjoying the beautiful sunshine and warm weather, we soon found ourselves at the river Rance. Across the bridge we starting looking for the WC that was suppose to be nearby….. Martha finally went into a small restaurant to ask direction which they cheerfully gave us ….but then said for us to just use their facilities…. We so enjoyed chatting with both the owners, a father and daughter as we ended up purchasing coffee before starting our trek back uphill. What a great way to spend a half hour and to again feel more like Travelers and not tourist as with our limited understanding of French we were able to exchange information with the local people.

We decided to see if we could make it up the path that led to the Ramparts which circle the old town……quite a walk of hairpin turns back & forth up a rocky dirt path to the top of the hill. Actually we ended up on the street that runs just below the ramparts so we were close to being most of the way back uphill and just around the corner from the Church of Saint Sauveur. This church is a thousand years old and very typical of the churches built in Brittany. BTW we are no longer in Normandy but Brittany, a coastal area with strong Celtic ties and a passion for crepes and cider….. we even this afternoon found two homes that actually have thatched roofs just like in Ireland. Locals take great pride in their distinct Breton culture. They sell Celtic music and like their Irish counterparts, Breton – many with red hair and freckles – are chatty and their music is alive with stories of their struggles against oppressors.

Driving back toward Dinard & St. Malo we dipped down to the coastal town of Cast-lo-Guildo for a photo shot of all the boats sitting on the dry mud flats waiting for the tide to come in. Across the way we could see the Chateau du Guildo standing proud and tall along the seaside…….then it was on to see if we could find the church in Dinard
For mass on Saturday afternoon…… found it, but only a mass on Sunday…..around the corner from the church we found the local beach, no water only mud flats waiting for the tide to flow back in, but the sandy beach had many people in bathing suits taking advantage of the warm weather. For the first time we were both outside with no coats, what a nice change for us.

Before heading home we checked out the Church in nearby La Richardais only to find that it also did not have a Saturday mass. But it did list another church in Dinard that had a 6 PM mass….. but now we need to locate it. Martha then did a quick turn down a country road…. Pulled into a lane leading to an abandoned home and said “ lets put your raincoat on and cut your hair”…. Of course several cars went by as we were doing this, am sure they wondered just what these two old ladies were up to…. But I was really getting shaggy and now my hair looks much better. Martha’s hair has grown out much nicer and she wants to leave it long until she gets home… I have no hair cutting experience so I am happy she doesn’t want me to cut on her hair.

Arriving back at our hotel late this afternoon we both worked on our journals and then went back out to the grocery store….we were out of our staple food bananas and we also picked up food tor the rest of the weekend . Asked several people for directions to the church that had the 6 PM Saturday Mass. We thought the church was in Dinard, so we were asking where in Dinard we could find St. Enogot’s Chuch. Turns out that this is the name of a nearby town and yes, it does have a church with a 6 PM Saturday Mass….. a lady did give us partial directions that headed us the right way as she thought we were looking for the town and not a church. End of story, yes we did find the church and have plans to go back tomorrow for evening mass.

Our final trip for the day was back to the beach (mud flats) in Dinard that we had visited earlier today. It was after 6 and time for the tide to be back in… It was beautiful….
Full of water and even a light surf rolling in…. many more people were on the beach enjoying the warm sun and water. Great ending to a wonderful day in Brittany.