When I got up the next morning, I could hear the radio downstairs. I got up and found that both Anne and her petite amis, the local taxi driver, were at home. Her friend, whose name I don't remember, was walking around in his underwear and spoke virtually no English. Anne had laid out some breakfast foods for me, fruit, juice, bread, and jams and I had a nice meal.
I didn't know why Anne was still there but it was a sunny day and I was eager to get out in the sun. I showered and packed quickly and was off.
Vilde du Marine is very close to the St. Malo peninsula. My plan was to ride around the peninsula. My goal for the day was Plouer-sur-Rance, a town just south of St. Malo; a ride of about 30 miles.
I stopped at a local boulangerie for the usual pain au chocolate and a bagette for the day's lunch. Next to the boulangerie was a market where I got some other food for the day. After stocking up on food, I rode along the same relatively busy highway along the coast. As this picture shows, it was flat farm fields with the occasional hill. I liked the look of the house. Also, you can see the St. Malo peninsula in the background.
Just past where the above photo was taken, I came to a major intersection on a slight uphill full of construction detours. It was one of a very few times when hyper-attention to what was around me was called for. I turned there and headed toward the touristy town of Cancale on St. Malo's east coast. After about a mile, I was able to turn off the main road and get down along the coast. The tide was out and the views of the shore showed the dramatic shifts of the waterline that occurs here.
The rocks in the distance, off the point, gave me some idea of the coming coastline views.
Clearly, Cancale is a major tourist destination. The road I rode in on was lined with cafes and tourist stores.
Here is a view from that bench looking back at the small bay that I had ridden around. Note the boat resting on the sand, waiting for the next tide.
I sat down and ate a banana. I tried to strike up a conversation with the woman sharing the bench with me. It didn't work as my French wasn't quite up to it. I did get her to take a picture, though.
About 50 feet past where this picture was taken was a beach where stalls sold oysters. It was a striking difference in perspective as right behind these pictures are all the tourist attractions.
Cancale was a good sized town full of stores, hotels, and cafes. It also had markets, boulangeries, and other businesses and homes. Once I got away from the coast road, the streets were quite narrow.
It was a nice place to spend a little time and I had a short day so I sat in the sun at a little cafe and had a hot chocolate. It was only after I went to the bathroom and saw the posters on the wall that I realized that I was sitting in my skin tight biking shorts at a gay bar/cafe. The perky bartender even came out and talked with me. This image was too delightful not to capture.
I had to ride through Cancale to get to the actual tip of the peninsula. While the road wasn't real busy, it was full of people on vacation and it had more cars than I had become accustomed to. Also, there were a fair number of smallish RVs that went by, as well. This isn't surprising given both all the natural beauty and tourist-friendly services in the area.
This photo was taken from the side of the road overlooking a cove that was surrounded by homes. I took several pictures of this scene to try and find one that didn't have lots of houses in it.
There was a large parking lot at the tip of the peninsula where people sold food and other stuff from stalls they had set up. There was even a hotel and a couple of restaurants there. The view of rocky islands just off the coast was stunning. Here are a couple of views.
From here, the route followed right along the coast. The views were fabulous. Many of them reminded me of sights I'd seen several times on the Big Sur Coast in California. Here are two that could have been taken in California!
I rode by a sand dune with a parking lot and path that people were walking on. I got off my bike to see what was there and got this view.
Here is the view looking 90 degrees to the right.
The route turned inland, just a bit, and the sight lines now had farm fields in them.
After about 8 fabulous miles, I entered the city of St. Malo, which takes up a large part of the western portion of the peninsula. As I have said before, my maps didn't do well in densely populated areas. I kept on the same road but it ended in very busy area. I asked and was given directions that dumped on a very busy road next to a horse racetrack. I asked several more people until I was given directions to get back on the same main road for a couple of miles. There was a good-sized shoulder so it wasn't as bad as I thought it would be but the cars were all going freeway speeds.
By the time I was off that road, I was also off the peninsula and into the mouth of the Rance river. It is this huge bay that makes up the western edge of the St. Malo peninsula. I stopped for some lunch. Here are some views over the estuary, including one of my bike and lunch.
I continued riding south along the eastern edge of the Rance.
I went through the scenic town of Saint Souliac.
The roads were tree-lined and a bit lumpy. I got turned around and ended up riding about halfway up a steep hill in the wrong direction before getting on the right road.
My host lived in Plouer-sur-Rance, a town just on the west side of the estuary. I arrived at Olivier's place in the early afternoon. His home is a converted hotel that looks both up and down the Rance. There are two bridges over the river and Olivier's house is between them. This is the one for cars only and look north, toward St. Malo, which is salt water.
This is the original one that looks south. It has a sidewalk on it and is the one that I rode over.
In truth, these pictures don't do justice to the location. They were both taken from Olivier's triangular dining/kitchen area that used to the be hotel's restaurant. The house itself had three floors (I think) of rooms. I dumped my stuff one flight up.
Olivier was a retired businessman who had worked in the fruit juice industry. He spoke English reasonably well and we had no problem communicating. He had a big family, which is why he wanted a lot of bedrooms. However, when I was there, it was only him and his rembunctious puppy Couscous.
After I got settled, he offered to drive me around the area. He had an odd looking car that was like a small, convertable jeep. I'd never seen anything like it and it was fun tooling around in it. We went to the nearby town of Dinan, the main tourist attraction in the area. Unfortunately, I forgot my camera, so I didn't get any photos.
We returned about 2 hours later. We made pasta for dinner and talked about ourselves and lives.
It had been a fabulous day. The ride around St. Malo made me want to come back and stay there someday and Olivier's house and hospitality was a fitting way to finish it. I went to sleep feeling good.