The drive from Le Crotoy to Mont Saint Michel was a bit painful, a 3 hour drive turned into nearer 5 hours, there was a big queue to cross the double bridge at Le Havre and other hold ups but we arrived mid afternoon. We had booked the nearest campsite to the Mont. There are huge car parks on the mainland, similar to the set up at theme parks, then you walk into the small village area, where there are restaurants, a couple of hotels, a big gift shop and the campsite. Access by vehicle into this area is restricted and we were given a code to get through the barrier to access the campsite. This is an extra 9Euros on top of your campsite fee. Once you are in the village area, you can either catch a free shuttle bus across the causeway to the Mont, walk or cycle the mile & a half. Cycling to the Mont is on trial until September, usually you would park your bike in the village area and take the shuttle or walk.
After a late lunch, we set off to walk to the Mont, the temp was still in the high 30’s, but there was a breeze coming off the sea, but as it was low tide, the sea was 15 km away!
Once you are on the Mont, top tip avoid the lower village area! When we walked through the main entrance you are greeted by a medieval street, but the overwhelming feeling was that I had been transported to Disney or the Shrek film where Shrek and Donkey visit Duloc. Avoid this area like the plaque, head for the ramparts or any side street to make your way to the Abbey, unless you want to jostle with the crowds for crepes, frites, ice cream and naff souvenirs at overinflated prices.
Not many visitors actually head for the top of the Mont as you have to pay to enter the Abbey, but it is quieter, cooler and architecturally impressive. The engineering and technical expertise required to build such a huge structure on a rocky, steep sided tidal island is impressive. No wonder it took 1,300 years to build!
These columns have a circumference of about 8 meters and they hold up the Abbey, the higher up, the lighter the materials used, so wooden vaulted ceilings rather than carved stone and slender pillars.
There is not much to see in the Abbey precincts, which has been a prison and a fortress apart from the impressive architecture and views of estuary. No displays of medieval monastic life, or grim prison conditions. In the evening there is a light show within the Abbey but we didn’t stay for that. There are still a small group of monks and nuns who live at the Abbey but its heyday was in the Middle Ages.
We walked back across the causeway which was marginally quicker than the shuttle bus, as the queues were huge.
We spent the rest of the warm evening, relaxing on our pitch & it had to be a BBQ for dinner. Temp didn’t drop below 31 until late and about 10.30 pm we walked back out to the dam, to watch the sky darken. We were hoping that the Mont would be dramatically lit at night, but it wasn’t spectacularly so, but I did spend some time trying to get the reflection in the water as the tide was in.
The motorhome was pleasantly cool despite the high temps and we slept really well. Sunday – a day at the beach is planned, after a quick provisions stop.
RoundandAbout 