How I Spent My Spring Vacation

We did two weeks +, mostly in Brittany (Bretogne to the locals), which is in the northwest on the Atlantic and La Manche (English Channel to the Brits), blessed with brilliant weather most days. Brittany is not too built up, hence not an overflow of tourists, as we found during a brief stop in Paris at the front end, in Montmartre at the Basilica of the Sacred Heart (Sacre Coeur).

Brittany has a separatist identity within France with a local dialect and spellings of its locations. Its inhabitants are descended from immigrants from English Cornwall, I was told. It is dotted with walled cities, built up to defend against rampaging Norsemen and anybody else. We visited a bunch.

Everybody was nice, even when I resorted to my rudimentary high school French. My wife is much better but still had difficulty speaking with locals. (She can read anything, but hearing and comprehending rapidly spoken speech is something else.)

We relied on AirBnBs, which I’m aware is a big problem for ordinary renters in many places. Usually I’m not a believer in boycotts as a form of political activism. For traveling we rely on them, because we hate hotels and hotel coffee. We need to be able to make our own coffee first thing in the morning without going out.

In France rentals, the hot water is very hot and the cold is very cold. French hosts and hostesses are not too demanding about your responsibilities. They basically want you to check out on time, take away the garbage, and leave the keys in the right place. In Brittany, we could afford places hard on the ocean with fabulous, postcard views. My question about apartments is, what is it with the doors on these places? They could protect the gold in Fort Knox. Is burglary a big problem?

I had a desire to see a big cathedral. We saw one in Quimper, the Saint Corentin. We also saw ancient churches in the other cities we visited, in Saint-Malo, Dinan, and Carnac. Saint Corentin was awesome, but so were the others we visited. Interestingly, these places all had a complex bevy of little side-spaces and cubby-holes for ancillary encounters with Jesus.

The biggest, most awesome sight was Mont Saint-Michel. As in other old cities, the insides are like a Tyson Corner mall, but with better food. For some reason, the souvenir shops in Mont Saint-Michel sold Samurai swords.

Food. It’s a big thing for me in my old age. To be honest, it always was. Everywhere we went the prices were fair and the quality was high. In a couple of places, we had some Asian food that was as good as anything I’ve had here. We didn’t have a bad meal anywhere.

I really like the no-tipping culture. I find it less stressful. I’d much rather pay upfront for service where I know the workers are well-paid, working and in retirement. The service itself is leisurely but good enough. Nobody is in a rush.

We took the high speed train from Paris to Saint-Malo. About a two and a half hour trip, 250 Euros for two, round trip and first class. The train was fast enough, but first class was nothing to write home about. From our destination we rented a car.

Driving was taxing. I found French drivers don’t give you much of the road on those narrow one-and-a-half lane city streets. They also tailgate a lot, though that might have been just me, driving slowly and gawking at everything. That happens to me here too. I did notice that drivers are very solicitous of pedestrians. If they see somebody waiting to cross the street, they unfailingly stop. Street signs are often missing or in small print. We encountered many road closures and got lost periodically. Google maps and Waze are very spotty in France. With that experience, my next rental would include the GPS that comes in the car.

We had a rental car from Enterprise that I banged up pretty well getting around tight corners. Fortunately I had the foresight to sign up for all the extra insurance, so it looks like I’ll escape liability for what was probably several thousand dollars worth of damage to the body. I’ve read some bitching about Enterprise on the web, but so far we have gotten away clean.

We flew to France via Iceland, saving a few bucks. Our previous trip was there, also wonderful. People in these places treat each other and visitors well, and do their jobs well. Back at Dulles Airport, evidently designed, organized, and run by chimps, it was a different story, as usual. That’s why I don’t go out much. I often think about a Plan B if orange shithead is president next year.