French Mystique Tours

19/09/2024

I've only got one day left of my Brittany vacation in the Golfe du Morbihan. This is not the first time I've visited this part of Brittany and I've actually been here twice before. After my visit in 2011 I wrote a photo report about that visit and if you are one the people who liked my prior post about the megaliths in this region then you will probably like reading my photo report about my 2011 visit as it is very megalith oriented. Click on the link below to read my report:

https://frenchmystiquetours.proboards.com/thread/38/brittany-vacation-gulf-morbihan?page=1&scrollTo=341

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I like rocks. I like really big rocks. Maybe this is due to the fact that I am a stone mason (or vice versa) but more likely I have inherited a caveman gene. Just ask my wife. Brittany has lots of

12/09/2024

Day 13 in Brittany, part 2. This post is dedicated to megaliths since I'm a big fan of archaeology and pre-history. A megalith in simple terms is a large, dry stone construction dating to the neolithic period with most being constructed from roughly 5,000BC to around 2,500BC (these are rough estimates). The basic types of megaliths are dolmen, tumulus, cairn and covered alley (these are types of burial chambers), menhirs (standing stones), cromlechs (a stone circle or enclosure of menhirs), and alignments (rows of menhirs). Brittany has one of the largest concentrations of megaliths anywhere on the planet and the area where I'm staying (Golfe du Morbihan) has the highest concentration of megaliths in Brittany.

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12/09/2024

Day 13 in Brittany, part 1. Breaking up today into two posts. Part 1 is my visit to Quiberon and a drive along its Côte Sauvage (Wild Coast).

11/09/2024

Day 12 in Brittany. Visited the pretty town of Auray today (where Benjamin Franklin landed after coming from America). It has a lovely and lively medieval downtown but the port by the river in the Saint-Goustan neighborhood was my favorite part of my visit. Definitely worth a visit if you're in the area.

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09/09/2024

Day 10 in Brittany. It was cloudy but still pleasant so I went to the Golfe du Morbihan and went for a walk on an island called Ile Berder, which is only accessible at low tide on the causeway that connects it to the mainland. It was a nice walk.

08/09/2024

Day 9 in Brittany. There was a music festival in the village today with the main attraction being a bagad band. A bagad is a traditional Breton pipe band and the most famous of them all was playing, the Bagad de Lann-Bihoué, which is the official band of the French navy.

06/09/2024

Day 7 in Brittany. It rained and was mostly gray and cloudy but once the rain stopped we made an excursion to the nearby lovely village of Le Guerno. The village has been given two touristic designations with one being a Commune du Patrimoine Rural de Bretagne ("rural village of heritage in Brittany" is the best translation) due to its architecture and the second being a Ville Fleuri (flowered village). Villages can be ranked on a scale of 1 to 4 flowers with 4 being the highest rating. Le Guerno has been given 4 flowers due to the effort of the town and its inhabitants to go all out in beautifying the village with flowers. It's tiny but charming and worth a visit if you're in the area.

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05/09/2024

Day 6 in Brittany. Visited Guérande, La Turballe and Piriac-sur-Mer. All were lovely but Piriac was my fave. Gorgeous old town with little lanes/side streets, beautiful port and lovely oceanfront. All the locals do their best to bring out the charm in their houses, many of which are centuries old.

04/09/2024

Day 5 in Brittany. Today's exploration was at the end of a peninsula at the Pointe de Pen-Lan. Hiked some scenic coastline and saw a couple of dolmen ruins (neolithic burial chambers). The beautiful weather continues.

03/09/2024

Hey everyone. French Mystique Tours is on vacation in Brittany until September 21st so I'll look forward to doing tours again with everyone after that date. But, to keep you up to date with what I'm doing on vacation and maybe inspire you to visit Brittany I'll be posting photos. Today I visited La Roche-Bernard (a Petite Cité de Caractère) and the local port and beach in the seaside town where I'm staying (Damgan).

22/04/2024

A follow up to my previous post about the light show at the cathedral in Chartres.

The cathedral was saved from being blown up by the Americans during WWII by one single American soldier, Colonel Welborn Griffith. He questioned the order to blow up the cathedral (it was suspected that there were snipers in the towers). By himself he went into town, climbed the tower and found no Germans. He rang the bells and hung an American flag from the tower and radioed to artillery to call off the bombing.

Later that same day he heard some American troops were under attack in the adjacent town of Lèves so he hopped on the back of a tank (hiding behind the turret as his only protection) and with a pistol in his left hand and a rifle in his right he went to do battle. He was shot to death after coming under heavy fire from mortars, machine guns and rifles.

The locals saw this happen and knew he was the same guy that saved their cathedral (and also gave his life to liberate their country). They dragged his body off the street and covered it with an American flag and bouquets of flowers and held vigil over his body all night until the next day when the U.S. troops recovered his body.

The town of Lèves has a ceremony every August 16th to commemorate the badassness of Colonel Welborn Griffith. There is even more amazing history about this hero if you want to do some google research. For now I'll post some pix of the light show on the cathedral facade and give thanks to Colonel Welborn Griffith. Without his sacrifice no one today would have a cathedral to visit.

22/04/2024

I was doing an overnight tour to Chartres with some customers last week and got to see the light show on the facade of the great gothic cathedral. There are illuminated buildings all throughout the town but I was so mesmerized by the amazing light show on the cathedral that I just sat there for 30 minutes in stunned silence while beautiful music made the perfect compliment to the visual display. I can't recommend highly enough an overnight in Chartres for the illuminations. If you're a cyclist then contact me and I'll arrange a 2 day cycling tour in that area with an overnight in Chartres to experience the light show. I guarantee you won't be disappointed. :)

21/04/2024

Following up my previous post about Fontainebleau with some photos.

21/04/2024

Went to Fontainebleau today and by chance it happened to be the 210th anniversary of Napoleon's farewell speech to his troops before he went into exile so I got to see the recreation actors reenacting the ceremony. Then I took a lovely stroll through town and around the château park. This is a little video I made. Napoléon waved at me!!!

23/01/2024

Hello everybody! Yeah, it's been a while since I've posted but I haven't forgotten about those of you who enjoy my posts and I'd like to put out a little reminder that I am also somewhat of an aspiring travel writer of all things French and if you'd like to sample my travel writing expertise (trust me, I don't use words that have more than 3 syllables) then check out the link below to see my reportage of a day exploring the countryside near Paris in the environs of Giverny. It's got loads of gorgeous countryside and quaint village photos plus my usual dose of personal humorous observations.

Ahhhh......Giverny. Who doesn't love impressionist paintings? And what impressionist lover visiting Paris doesn't want to visit the house of Claude Monet? The sense of anticipation as you stroll

09/10/2023

Fishing Reserve. No Fishing Allowed.

24/09/2023

Some pix of my countryside explorations today.

20/09/2023

Went for a walk in the Bois de Vincennes and paid a visit to the lovely Jardin de l'Ecole du Breuil, which you can visit if you do French Mystique Tours 3 Hour Marne River / Bois de Vincennes Tour.