North Brittany

Rose: Dave continues to bat 1,000 on lodging choices. Each place we stay during our time in Brittany is exactly where we want to be. Our spacious and beautifully appointed room at La Meffrais, a manor house located a few miles outside of the historic half-timbered port town of Dinan, offers a gracious country refuge. Tall casement windows look out over a view of a tree-shaded back garden and two horses in a paddock next door. 

Rose: Apératif on the terrace of La Meffrais. The evening is warm, the garden is peaceful, the champagne is Bollinger. A chat with the owners, Samantha and Philippe, reveals that they quit their jobs in accounting and finance four years ago and purchased La Meffrais. They spent a year repairing and redecorating and were ready to welcome guests just as the pandemic closed everything down. But they are not daunted; they had a good year in 2022, and they expect 2023 to be even better.

Rose: Outdoor dinner at Le Poisson Ivre (The Drunken Fish) in the port of Dinan, with a view of the harbor. Sardine salad and oeuf mayonnaise for Dave; and for Anna, filet of sea bass, preceded by a very large, very tender, artichoke. (To her great joy, since when traveling, vegetables on the menu are often few and far between.)

Thorn: A “Lunch Problem”. After a morning hike to Fort de la Latte and back, it’s time for lunch, except we’ve left it too late and the few restaurants we come across are no longer serving. Also, it’s Sunday, and all village shops and even the supermarchés are closed. (We should have known better! This is not our first French rodeo!) Never mind. We snack on cherries and apricots from the Rennes farmer’s market and plan our evening meal.

Rose: Dinner! After our midday fast, we treat ourselves to bavette à point (steak medium rare) and Crozes-Hermitage (a delicious red wine from the northern Rhône valley) at Le Cantorbery, a traditional restaurant in the historic quarter of Dinan. The white-clothed tables are placed close together, and we strike up friendly conversation with a young Australian couple next to us. Like us, they had to cancel a European trip due to the pandemic and are just now making the trip. Also like us, they are tennis fans, and they try to convince us that we must complete our own personal Grand Slam by attending the Australian Open. Highly unlikely, but we play along.

Rose: The “Lunch Problem” is easily solved by purchasing picnic supplies: baguette, cheese, apples, sliced ham, paté forestier, cornichons, a bottle of rosé, a wine opener, two plastic glasses, two knives, and a packet of paper napkins. Freedom! We can now stop whenever and wherever hunger pangs strike.

Rose/Thorn: So many interesting villages and restaurants; so little time!

Rose: The discovery of Tréguier, a vibrant and well-preserved village of stone and half-timbered houses, artisanal shops, cafés, a central church square, and a small estuary harbor.

Thorn: We had been looking forward to seeing the so-called fjords of northern Brittany, but our timing coincides with low tide, and so instead of leafy, tree-lined waterways and boats bobbing peacefully at anchor, we find rivers of mud and vessels stranded in the mire.

Rose: The restored, thatch-roofed hamlet of Menehan, wind-swept and wonderful.

Rose: The view from our apartment in Morlaix. A winding ascent of 60 stairs (Dave counted) leads to our spacious apartment in the Duc de Bretagne Apart-Hotel, and the climb is well worth the view of the viaduc and main square.

Rose: Apératif and dinner at Le Grand Café de la Terrasse overlooking the Place des Otages (Hostage Square), named for the 60 citizens of Morlaix who were rounded up in retribution for French resistance attacks on the Nazis. The hostages were briefly held in the square before being deported to concentration camps. Reading the memorial plaque and standing on the spot where it happened, history feels very close indeed.

Rose: Simply being here, in this place where wildflowers, ferns and foxgloves decorate the roadsides, wheat fields give way to woods, and white sand beaches hide among fantastical mounds of boulders along the many-fingered coastline. No doubt about it; we are falling under Brittany’s spell.