Belon oysters and Pont Aven.

Great sleep in the old hotel after the ridiculous night at the campsite. We passed out before 9:00. Nights have been cool here because we’re so close to the ocean. There are comforters on the beds each night.

We start out day by riding to upper Pouldu and discover many more restaurants and more of a town. There’s a Tourist Info bureau, so we stop to get local maps which have been life-savers for us. As we ride away I’ve forgotten my helmet on the stone wall and I‘m starting to ride away without it. And for some reason April is getting a big kick out of it, she says: “first day on a bike? Don’t how to ride? No skillz.” Then she realizes she was riding away without her helmet also. So she tried to surreptitiously reach up to her head to see if her helmet is on. Then she realizes she was doing the same thing, hers was on the back of her bike. It was so funny to see the look on her face. Aaah the simple pleasures.

We leave the TI place and immediately take a few wrong turns. Lost in the first 100 yards!

Finally get on the right roads and again hug the coast line, zigzagging along small lanes. The roads surfaces are great, there’s no traffic. While we’re not making much progress on the map, at least we’re not on those sand bike paths. We aim for the little port town of Doelan which has a bridge across its inlet. Pretty harbor. Then we head over to Merrien, expecting to get lunch there. It’s an even smaller town/port with no cafes. But its gorgeous. It was also a favorite harbor for Breton smugglers. There’s a little hiking trail out to the point, we can also access it by riding, which we do. The water is really blue and crystal clear. It reminds us of Sardinia. Then we head over to the port of Belon, which is home to one of Brittany’s most celebrated oysters. We were expecting to then take a boat ride up to Port Aven. But there was only one boat/day and we had missed it. No big deal. We settle in for a great lunch. I have some Belon oysters followed by a huge plate of moules-frites (mussels and fries). The mussels had a light curry broth, superbe! April went for the omelet/frites. Also had some fermented cider.

But then we had to ride again. So we backtracked on some back roads, hit a smaller highway and booked some fast miles. Turns out we got close to Pont Aven in no time. We stopped at a supermarket and got some fruit and chocolate. Also picked up a better map. Then we found a sweet back road into Port Aven, shaded, no cars, new surface, mostly downhill. Again the simple pleasures.

We found an old hotel right in the center of town that had wifi. May be noisy but we were high up on the 3rd floor. And Pont Aven is gorgeous. Maybe the prettiest little town we‘ve ever been in. Oh yes, April loves this little vignette: when we get to the hotel, we’re both saying a few sentences in French and it’s going well. The women speaks no English. So I say to her in French: Avez-vous le wifi? (Do you have wifi). And she replies: Je ne parle pas Anglais. (I don’t speak English). She thought I was speaking English. What a blow to my ego! As far as I can tell this is April’s favorite event of the trip so far!

Great shower, I nap, the Tiger scours the town, finds a great restaurant for dinner. Small little place, I have a salmon tartare as an app, then a coquilles St Jacques (scallops), April had a nice swordfish, both had some Breton potatoes (so simple yet wonderful, little roasted yellow potatoes) and ratatouille. And we split a peach melba for dessert. We chatted up the waitress/owner; turns out her grand-pere was a famous salmon fisherman, she claimed he won the world championship of salmon fishing (I personally wasn’t aware of such a title), showed us the old pics of the guy. And for Paul Flessner (who asked me about this) the salmon was wild, not farmed.

As you can tell we’re loving the food. Hope we’re not gaining weight!

One more note, all along the coast there are awesome long-distance hiking trails. These were first created/used by the region’s douniers, or customs officers, looking for smugglers/spies/etc.

We rolled back to our room stuffed and decided to stay here another night because the town seemed so pretty. More on that in the next entry.