A Little Mountain Climbing

Although we saw Mont St. Michel by night from below, we thought better of trying to visit it in the cold and rainy night, so we decided to find our hotel and come explore in the morning.  It was our first night in France and we were exhausted from jet lag and traveling.  WE couldn't wait to find our hotel, and hit the sack.

Only we couldn't find our hotel, partly because the street signage and directions are TERRIBLE here in France (more on that later), and partly because the picture on the website for the hotel showed an old stone farmhouse right on the shore, with Mont St Michel looming in the background, and sheep grazing all around.  It looked charming!  But no such place was to be found anywhere along the shore.  Finally we stopped at another hotel to ask, and they pointed to the dingy motel across the street.  What?  It was not an old stone farmhouse surrounded by fields and grazing sheep, but a run-down sixties era motelish place surrounded by parking lots, souvenir shops, and restaurants.  Sure, it was near by the Mount St. Michel, but there were several hotels blocking the view between our hotel and the mount.  The picture on the website had totally been photoshopped!  

Our disappointment didn't end there.  When we lugged our luggage upstairs we found our room was very small, and crammed with two double beds.  There was not room for our luggage and us too!  Then Dennis walked into the bathroom, and did a double take.  "Uh, are we missing something?"  Sure enough, there was a bathtub and a sink, but no toilet!  What?  Baffled we wandered the halls looking for a community toilet.  None on our floor.  We found one down stairs.  Really?  We have to go downstairs to the lobby to use the toilet?  You've got to be kidding me!  Back up in the room, Dennis pointed to a very small closet on the other side of the cramped room and jokingly said, "Maybe the toilet is in there."  Sure enough!

We were happy enough to get out of there in the morning, and do a little mountain climbing, up Mont St. Michel.  The island fortress with it spires and stone buildings jutting up into the sky from the flat basin was unreal - and reminded me of Hogwarts School in Harry Potter.

The fortress was built on this rocky island a kilometer into the English Channel in beginning in 708 A.D.  when St. Aubert bishop of Avranches had a visit from an St. Michel, the archangel telling him to build a church on the rocky island, saying "If you build it, they will come." (And I thought they got line that from a baseball movie.)  Well, he built it, then built a big fortress wall around it, so when "they" did come, they couldn't get in.  Huh?

The French blue, white, and red (I said red, white and blue, but had to be corrected) flag of France, and the bright red with two gold lions flag of Normandy whipped overhead.

I love the old stone buildings and the flower boxes.  I really want to paint his one.

Just before the drawbridge is the famous restaurant, la Mere Poulard, that was making omelets in the middle ages.  Now their omelets sell for close to $30, (there had been a bit of inflation since the Dark Ages) so we didn't eat there.

The drawbridge was cool.  My boys would have loved that!

I just love this picture, with the various architecture and signage.

The narrow winding street (there was only one that wound up to the church on top) were packed with people who shopped in the many souvenir shops and creperies on the way up the hill.
I loved all the street lamps and old metal signs hanging overhead.  Back in the middle ages, most people couldn't read, so the signs were symbols and pictures so that folks could know what kind of shop they were visiting.

It was kind of eerie looking down on the flat barren silt with streams of water here and there.  Back then, this was all water, and even now, where there is a very high tide, the island is again surrounded by water.  You can't see it from this picture.  It looks like there is nothing out there but another small island.  But we actually saw hundreds of tiny colored dots way out there on the sand, swarming together in clusters.  They were people!  Hundreds of people walking over the vast tidal silt toward the island!  Bizarre!  Why didn't they just drive there like the rest of us? (there is a road now going right up to the island with a parking lot for cars and tour buses.)   What kind of lousy tour did those poor folks sign up for?  Apparently, Mont St. Michel, is one of the top pilgrimage sights in Christianity, and walking across that wet sand, many of them barefoot, from the peninsula far away must be part of that pilgrimage. 



Up near the top there are more fortress walls to protect the church and abbey that were inside.

Cool, huh?

Gargoyles watch us as we ascended those old stone steps.

The weary pilgrim stops to take a bath before entering the church.  (I sure hope that wasn't for holy water.)

Looking straight down.

How on earth did they build this place?

The Gothic church at the tippy top, with its flying buttresses and high vaulted ceilings, was filled with light from the stained glass windows.

I just loved how warm, soft, pastel light played on the cold, hard, grey stone surfaces of the church, and had a bit of fun trying to capture that with my camera,

You can see how the high Gothic arches were meant to inspire the worshipers, and make them feel just a bit closer to heaven.

Mt. St. Michel, was an abbey, and the cloister, the small enclosed garden, surrounded by a double colonnade was where the monks came to silently meditate.  There were no windows, and this was supposed to be a holy, yet beautiful place, away from the world.  I thought it was delightful!

I wonder if the monks were ever tempted to play hide and seek in there?



They have since removed part of the enclosure and added a window.  Who is that cute couple?

I thought this little guy was cute running through the colonnade.

Then into the great hall where the monks silently ate their meals around 3 huge square tables and a few enormous fireplaces.

This window was my favorite:  seashells and cupcakes.

A few pilgrims, meditating. 

Down in a crypt under the church (yet still hundreds of feet up).

This huge wheel was like a giant hamster wheel.  Six grown men, two abreast, would climb inside and walk to turn the wheel in order to lift building materials and supplies up the side of the cliffs and fortress wall!  It was incredible.  Six men, huh?  maybe we need one of these at our house.  Really put those boys to work.

Look at the size of that thing!

Making our way back down the Mount.

On the very top of the steeple is a golden statue of St. Michel - looking very much like an angel moroni with wings from afar.  There was a pair of golden wings there.  I couldn't resist trying them on for size.  What do you think?  Aren't they me?

After all our mountain climbing, we had to stop for a Nutella crepe.  It would not be our last.

This shingled house looked like it was right out of the dark ages.

We really enjoyed our little trip up the Mont, and back in time, even if we didn't make a pilgrimage over vast wet sand barefoot to get there.