Mont St. Michel

The bells of l’Eglise St. Pierre are ringing, and now the Abbey bells toll from up above. Matins. It is seven in the morning. This is possibly the coolest place I have ever slept. Absolutely it is a tourist trap, but when the last tour bus rolls away we are left on a medieval island, surrounded by dark waters, the brown foam, l’ecume, washing on the shores, the marais around the river in front and the green green fields of Normandie and Bretagne stretching into the distance. I can’t make out the shops selling souvenirs that we drove past from this distance.

On the Mont, we are taken back in time. The island rises hundreds of feet up, a massif of rock, with a gilded abbey on top, its spire rising towards heaven and the blue blue sky. We sneak in through the back door, as the tide has blocked the main gate. The Grand Rue goes under the main gatehouse, portcullis, drawbridge and huge wooden doors and then winds its cobbled way up and up and around, up stairs, past hotels and restos ranging from basic to posh, all a bit pricey, past kitschy souvenir shops where we can buy replica swords and our very own Bayeux Tapesty (20% off today only, very good price!) for only $500 per panel.

We continue up to our hotel, closed, so we have to ask around, and find that the same owners own the Hotel St Pierre. We check in, the office dark and messy, our reservation written into a long ancient looking bound book. The concierge leads us out, up, through side passages and up more stairs to our room. It, like the guidebook says, is nothing special. Tegan says the décor hurts our eyes, and it is even more ugly than some of the rooms in Fontainebleau Palace, where, in places, ici et la,  queens and empresses had chosed overly busy and ornate patterns for the furniture, walls, ceilings, artwork. True this was only a few of the dozens of rooms, but this room on the Mont was seems to have been cobbled together from 1970s Thrift Shops. Tant pis.

We drop our bags and head out exploring – up the cobbled streets, down secret passageways only as narrow as my shoulders, along the battlements, cutting through an empty church, candles lit on the sides and light streaming through the stained glass. Jeanne d’Arc stands guard at the front doors. We peek through arrow slits and over the parapets at the steep slopes down to the Channel, La Manche, and love the wildness of the woods that manage to hold on to the steep rock, and must have for almost 1000 years since the abbey was first built, upon St Michel’s, St Michael’s directions. We can buy statuettes of him too, in various poses with his sword, subduing a variety of beasts and human adversaries. Since then it has been enlarged numerous times and over the years both religious pilgrims and tourists have been flocking here, and the services to serve them have been provided: places to buy sacred objects and food, to sleep, to pray, and likely through the ages all of the pilgrims and tourists have been gouged. The souvenirs are cheesy (really, snow globes WITH St Michel protecting them?) and the meal we have is decent but overpriced. Still, being here is walking to a combination castle and theme park. After we eat Tegan needs to sleep so Rowan and I explore in the darkness. The Mont is illuminated at night, so as we creep around, we can look up and see the stone abbey bathed in golden light. We poke down lanes, wondering where they might lead. There are secret gardens with iron gates, a graveyard that is more mystical than frightening. We walk narrow and broad staircases and peer into the tiny courtyards outside houses (it seems some people live here permanently). Through one semi-closed gate and down a few stairs we see a darkened garden, but we run away giddy with adrenalin when we hear voices. We walk down to the base of the Mont, onto the sandstone, le grès, now that the tide has rolled out, and marvel at the construction of this village on a rock in the sea. We sneak about some more, poke into courtyards and look through windows. We are taken aback by the quiet of the place, for at night the tourists are gone, the few who remain are getting ready for bed, sleeping, or, like us, creeping around in the darkness.

And now the sun is up. The bells have stopped. There is mist over the estuary and the distant trees. The morning light from the east warms up the stone, turning it from greys and black to reds and browns and golds. The seagulls, les mouettes, are up and flying around, searching for breakfast scraps. We will too and then continue our exploring.