1936 On the Continent

region, from which the fishermen set out for Iceland, and the setting of Pierre Loti’s celebrated novel,
Pêcheurs d’Islande
. A short crossing of fifteen minutes will take you to the red granite cliffs of the Ile de Bréhat.
    From Saint-Brieuc, you can also go to Guingamp, a small inland town in a lovely valley where the Saturday before the first Sunday in July there is an important “pardon” at the Church Notre Dame du Bon Secours, a religious ceremony peculiar to Brittany and extremely colourful. Among the hotels of this town, the Hôtel du Commerce is remarkable for its meticulous cleanliness. You might almost be in Holland!
    From Guingamp, across a somewhat severe but typically Breton landscape, you will come to the calm and austere bishopric Tréguier, with the spire of its magnificent cathedral dominating the entire town. The numerous gardens in the courtyards of the houses give this city a unique atmosphere. To the west, Lannion, a small town situated on a river, has several curious old houses, but the most interesting thingabout it is undoubtedly the steep coast near by, the “Coast of Granite.”
Morlaix
    Continuing along the coast, you next arrive at Morlaix, which has many interesting churches and a gigantic modern viaduct which overlooks the entire town. Well organised autocar tours enable you to visit all the surrounding region. Stop at the Hôtel d’Europe, Rue d’Aiguillon, but take your meals at the restaurant de la Tour d’Argent, Rue des Lavoirs. While going down the “river” of Morlaix, you should visit Carnatec, a pretty and popular beach, Saint-Pol-de-Léon, an old bishopric where the Chapel de Kreisker has an open-work belfry over 200 feet high, and Roscof, a port celebrated for its lobster and for the mildness of its climate. Most of the early vegetables eaten in London are exported from this coast.
    From Morlaix, after heading inland and crossing the Monts d’Arée, the line of small hills separating maritime Brittany from the interior, you should visit the region of Huelgoat. It is wonderfully situated, and its small wooded valleys and maze of rocks are particularly fascinating. The most famous is the Grotto of Artus, which has the same story told about it as in Wales.
    Brest, a large military port and important commercial city, of 75,000 inhabitants, is for all intents and purposes the capital of maritime Brittany. It has few objects of interest for the visitor, apart from its impressive military port whose roadstead, protected by a narrow channel, shelters the French Atlantic fleet. It is the Portsmouth of France. Naturally there are many hotels of all classes, among which I can especially recommend the Hôtel Moderne, Place Anatole France, at the entrance to the city. A sailors’ restaurant, the Restaurant de l’Océan, 46 Quai de la Douane, offers an excellent choice of sea food. But the clientele is rather mixed, While visiting the roadstead, an immense anchorage which could easily hold all the warships of Europe, it is better not to take photographs near the many forts and outworks which defend it.
    From Brest you should go to Plougastel-Daoulas, the picturesque locality on the other side of the roadstead, which has a curious calvary surrounded by 150 stone figures.
Quimper
    In the centre of the large peninsula, which extends from the other side of the bay of Audierne to meet the great billows of the Atlantic, rises Quimper, the most Breton of all the towns in Brittany, where the Cathedral Saint-Corentin shows all the phases of the historical development of the Breton style, and where the museum of Breton antiquities, installed in the buildings of the ancient bishop’s palace, contains a unique collection of documents on old Brittany. Among the hotels choose the Hôtel de l’Epée, Rue du Parc, where you will find the local gastronomic specialities,
filet de sole Saint-Corentin
and
pâté de perdreau au foie gras
.
    From Quimper you absolutely must take the excursion which, by Douarnenez, sardine fishing village and important centre of the canning industry, and Audierne, another important fishing port, leads to the most desolate, but most grandiose, region of Brittany, the Pointe du Raz, the Baie des Prépassés and the wild Ile de Sein.
    A long angular rock whipped by the winds and the sea’s surging, the Pointe du Raz is hollowed by a tremendous funnel, the “Hell of Plogoff,” where the waves, as they are engulfed, thunder like cannon shots. One must be careful