Paris, je t'aime! Part 13: It's My Island

In Part 12 of the France blogs, we spent some time in solemn reflection at the American D-Day sites on the Normandy coast.

Mont Saint-Michel,

in all of its after dark glory

After we finished up at Pointe du Hoc, we started the final push in the car to Mont Saint-Michel (MSM from this point on).  We initially planned to arrive in MSM a bit earlier in the day, but time got away from us, so our arrival at the designated car park didn't happen until close to 6:30.  Thankfully, it was still fairly light when we made it, and we could clearly see where we were headed.

Driving toward MSM.

"I see it!  I see it!"

We are not in Paris any longer

Since we weren't in high tourist season, we knew most eating establishments would close down before we got there, so as I mentioned in our last Paris blog, we'd brought the fixin's for a picnic, with one notable exception - we still needed to find a baguette!  While we were barreling along the country roads toward MSM, we actually passed a baguette vending machine, but neither of us realized what it was until we'd already gone past.  (Me: "was that...a vending machine..for bread?"  Chris: "OMG!  I thought it was, but I wasn't sure!"  Spoiler alert - we should have stopped).  MSM is located across a causeway from a small town center, and thankfully, the gift shop there was open until 7.  We snuck in under the wire, procured bread and more cheese (in case the cheese that stunk us out of the room in Paris really had gone bad), and headed back toward the car to reclaim our luggage.

They have a thing for painted cows in MSM.

I totally would have climbed in the big lawn chair,

but it was too wet.

Success!

Okay, time for a bit of info on MSM itself.  The island sits about 2/3 of a mile off the coast from the mainland, and until the first bridges were built in the 1400's, it was only accessible at low tide; pilgrims, who had been coming to the site since the 8th century, would walk across the tidal flats to visit the abbey and other religious sites (the bishop at the time had a vision of the Archangel Michael telling him to build an abbey on the island, hence its name).  Due to this lack of easy accessibility, MSM has also been used as a defensive stronghold and a prison throughout its tenure.  A causeway was built several years ago that allowed easier access for tourists; the area around MSM faces supertides a few times each year, and those would still swamp the causeway, making the island a true island once again for a few hours.  The new bridge was opened in 2015, and it fixed that issue; now, the island is accessible at all times of the day or night, regardless of the tides.

I'd read that while it's cool to visit MSM at any point in time, it's really neat to stay the night on the island itself (as opposed to in one of the many hotels across the causeway on the mainland); only 50 people live full-time on the island (20% of those being monks/nuns), so you kind of have the whole place to yourself once the sun goes down and the tourist hordes abate.  We booked a room with a terrace overlooking the bay, and it was here we planned to enjoy our picnic dinner.

We wandered the car park area for a bit, and we eventually found the loading area for the trams that take you to the island.  While you can walk the causeway (it's not that long), it was still misty outside, and since we were checking in for the night, we had a set of bags with us.  The tram was much easier.

Not without our baguette!

I was actually getting decent use out of my scarf at this point.

A shot of the tidal flats from MSM,

looking back toward France

Since we arrived so late, we checked in at our hotel's (La Vieille Auberge) sister property, the Hotel Auberge St. Pierre.  While most of the rooms for each hotel were located in the same building as the lobby (like a normal hotel), the rooms with terraces were right in the middle of the island, and that meant a lot of stair climbing to get there (that's why we left the big suitcase at the George!).  The hotel's porter (a very fit young man, as you might imagine) showed us the way and helped us get set up in the room.  We were tired and hungry, so dinner was first up on the agenda!

Picnic selfie in the dark!

The view from our terrace,

looking back at the mainland

More views from our room

The top of the abbey from our terrace -

that's Michael up there at the very top

We finished up our meal, keeping an eye out for any seagulls that might try to get too near (we really didn't see seagulls while we were there, which is strange, because everyone on TripAdvisor bitches about them nonstop; however, we did see what we thought were either bats or swallows, swooping around the lighted top of the abbey), and once we were full, we headed back out of the room to explore the island at night.

We saw a few other people who were staying on the island, but we wandered around almost in perfect silence; it was such a cool atmosphere.

Picture dump time!

Looking back at the island from the causeway - 

see the small, lighted doorway near the middle bottom

of the shot?  That's the only entry/exit point to the island.

So.many.stairs.

I just noticed that Chris has our picnic

trash bag in his hand - 

we didn't want to take the chance of the remains

of that cheese (which was delicious, by the way)

stinking us out of another hotel room.

Like for real, the stairs were madness

I tried to get this cat to come out of the tree

and cuddle, but it just gave me this angry face.

Probably for the best.

Yeah, I don't know how we ended up here.

The porter didn't take us this way,

that's for sure.

Best selfie so far, am I right?

This is right when you come in the gate,

and I get it.  There's a lot of mud around.

This is the main road through the shops,

restaurants, and hotels on the island

Snails everywhere!

We could have brought some garlic,

drawn butter, and toast points with us!

There's even a tiny cemetery on the island

Coming out of the alleyway

Chris was in, above

After trucking back up the stone stairs to our room, we were tuckered out after a long and emotionally taxing day (the bottle of wine surely helped, as well).  We passed out pretty quickly, ready for a long night's sleep!  On the next blog, we wake up in MSM and see it in the light!

Later!

Amy

P.S. - Steps for today totaled 21,622.  That's 10 miles of walking, even though we drove around in a car all day!