literature – Languages and Lights

We are all made of stories

As I progress West along the North coast, I grow more and more aware that I am reaching the end of my tour of Brittany. I have gone back to my roots and met my spiritual ancestors; the painter Paul Gauguin and the writers Victor Segalen and Jack Kerouac, who travelled the world the worldContinue reading “We are all made of stories”

Trégastel – Vallée des Traouïero

The coast of pink granite is truly a lovely landscape. Big pink granite, rounded off by the elements, line the coast of Trebeurdun, Trégastel and Perros-Guirrec. They look like voluptuous hippos, hauled up on the beach, sun-burnt, sleepy. Saint Mamert, Pancrace and Boniface are called the “Saints de Glace” “Icy Saints”, as between the 11thContinue reading “Trégastel – Vallée des Traouïero”

Huelgoat and Bretons d’ailleurs

Eventually I tired of the wind along the coast. I was near Roscoff,and it was blowing from dawn to dusk, kicking up the dust and driving off trains of thoughts. I headed both inland and inwards, to Huelgoat. Huelgoat, “the upper wood” in Breton, is pronounced “U-èl-go-a-t”. It is a quaint village in the centerContinue reading “Huelgoat and Bretons d’ailleurs”

The Aulne maritime and the Nantes-to-Brest canal

East of the stunning pont de Trévénez (discover here), you go up the Aulne maritime, the estuary of the Aulne river. At Port-Launay, a lock stops the tides, and turns the meandering river into the canal de Nantes à Brest. But a place called Le Passage, fifteen kilometres down river from Port-Launay, was the ancestralContinue reading “The Aulne maritime and the Nantes-to-Brest canal”