Le Château de Costaérès

Well, this blog wouldn't be called Beached in Brittany if it didn't feature beaches, would it?

Quite a lot of beaches, actually. Beaches are my bag. (Interesting expression that, 'my bag', and I made a detour to look it up.

The OED says: A preoccupation, mode of behaviour or experience; a distinctive style or category; esp. a characteristic manner of playing jazz or similar music.

1960 J. Hendricks in D. Cerulli et al.140 Lack of acceptance is a drag... Man, that's really in another bag. 

‘Bag’ is a current piece of trade jargon for hip musicians, and means something between a personal style and a body of work.

Back to beaches.

My favourite beach here in Brittany is la plage Tourony.
I discovered it by chance when I was searching for a certain pink castle, a picture of which I had on my bedroom wall in the house in England for several years: it now hangs above the piano here. It is one of those iconic images of (for me) the loveliest place in Brittany - La Côte Granit Rose, and so it frequently features on postcards, tourist websites. even place mats. I have not yet gone so far as to buy the latter, I did recently purchase the mug though.

It was sometime in 2014, I think, and I was back for a brief visit to check the house, tackle the overgrown garden, catch up with friends, that kind of five-day break, and I'd driven to Trégastel for lunch and a walk on the sand, and thought, 'While I'm here I'll look for that pink castle', spotted this sign, et voilà. The rest is history.

Plage de Tourony is not especially large, nor does it benefit from restaurants, cafés or bars, although on Mondays and Wednesdays in summer a lady arrives with a converted horsebox and makes fresh galettes and crépes to order.

It does have parking right by the sand.

And it does have is a toilet although when the weather is hot the walls are covered in flies.

And it does have this view:

and this one:

The lighthouse on the much-loved Sentier des Douaniers, the old path used by customs officers to catch smugglers, that goes from the beach at Trestraou to the small town (village) of Ploumanac'h.

and in places the pink granite on the beach looks like this:

The plage Tourony is my No 1  Playground to which I return at least twice a week, sometimes daily if the mood takes me. It's a forty minute drive from my house along decent roads that are fast and usually empty so it's not an arduous journey. And it's well worth it. As soon as I see the sea I start to smile, as soon as I drive into Trégastel I start to grin, and as soon as I pull into the parking at Tourony I sigh with contentment.

At low tide I can walk right out to the castle and there is a little beach round the side where I can swim safely. It's half a mile walking over mud, sand and rocks.

At high tide I swim from the beach. During the year since I came back to Brittany I've been getting stronger and stronger and swimming futher and further with the aim of reaching the castle at high tide. Last Sunday I did it. I walked into the sea, started swimming and didn't stop until I'd made it to l'Île de Costaérès.

I sat on the beach and wished I'd been with friends who could have witnessed my success.
And then, of course, I had to swim back. I could have waited: the tide was ebbing, a few more hours and it would have been possible to walk but, well, I am sometimes impatient and my lunch was in my rucksack on Tourony and so I swam again.

Admittedly I rock-hopped a little: pausing to catch my breath on the pink granite which was, by then, emerging from the water. And by the time I returned the tide was well on the way out and this was the view.

More importantly, this was the lunch that awaited me:

Those cakes - kouign amman - are a Breton speciality and delicious but loaded with fat and sugar and so I ration them. I think I earned that one last Sunday though!

N'est-ce pas?

More Info:

Le chateau de Costaérès

If you'd like to rent the pink castle (15,000 euros per week, good luck, let me know and I'll swim over and say Hi!) 

Trégastel Tourism

Kouign Amman

Back to Business - Early September

It's three day after La Rentrée here in Brittany, that time of the year when, traditionally, the summer holidays come to an end and everyone returns to school, college, work.

The village is quiet now that the visitors have left: the Ladies from Rennes - usually three, this year only two - whose arrival is marked by the opening of shutters and the appearance of gardeners, left a week ago. I'm not sure if they'll be back for Christmas in this, the village in which they were born and raised, and where the young 'Tonton Paul' used to pull their pigtails and steal kisses. He dated one of the sisters in his senior years. Now he's in a care home and suffering dementia, I wonder if he recalls those childhood days? I hope so.

And the Germans have gone. They spent some time buying plastic boxes in which to store their linens and summer clothes because mice had taken up residence and made nests of their sheets and shorts. We have a lot of mice here in the countryside. At this time of year they begin to invade the house, I've already caught and killed one that was in the bedroom, bold as brass, sauntering across my rug. The dog will dispatch them, given the chance, he's a good mouser, but usually it's left to my battery-operated trap that lures them with peanut butter and kills them quickly.

I'd let the mice share the house if they weren't so destructive and dangerous to the wiring. And if they didn't breed so efficiently. And if they had better bladder control: mice pee constantly, they're not healthy housemates.

Dr H. was here for a whole month in July but even then we didn't get to spend many days out together. She's renovating a little house outside the village and works hard while the weather is good. When she takes time off she's my Activity Buddy - we kayak at the Pink Granite Coast, we've planned to ride horses Western-style, we explore and have adventures. Useful to have a doctor as a companion if the adventures are a little too wild at times.

And the two English holiday homes were only occupied briefly. One is, apparently, for sale, the owners don't have the time to come to France as often as they did when their children were small and I haven't seen them at all since I returned last year. The other owners have begun to take holidays in Spain in the winter: it's not always easy to relax and rest when there's work to be done on your house. And illnesses are taking their toll.

The lovely lady from Holland departed with her daughter last weekend. J. flew in to Rennes so that she could share the long drive back with her mum.

I like it when R. is here.

I like it when all of the Summer People are here. The village is lively and there's not so much a buzz, more a gentle hum, when they're back. And, of course, Summer People mean summer weather and all the pleasures that brings.

This week the swallows are also preparing to leave.

I watch every morning to see if they're still here. Happily this year they raised three broods and all their babies, and those of the house martins, are fully-fledged and ready to set off on their migration south. Some years a baby is left behind. It's sad but it's nature: if the parents remain to feed it all three will not survive the winter. Better the breeding adults leave with the flock and return net year to raise more young.

The Summer People have left, the swallows are gathering, but there are still sunny days left to enjoy another day of swimming at Trégastel, another morning walking the Sentier des Douaniers followed by an al fresco lunch at Ploumanac'h.

And maybe an Indian Summer to ripen the butternut squashes that have taken over the potager?