On Sunday morning, we headed to Mont Saint-Michel, which is an island in France. When driving here, you began to see the island when we were still 15 minutes away. The closer you got, the more of a "Wow" factor you got! This island is basically built on top of itself...does that make sense? It is so tall, and everything is just crammed on this small island. The strangest part about it is that nothing else is around it. There are just open fields and a few little French houses. Part of the reason for that is the high tide comes up so far (around the island) that not much else can be around it or it would be ruined.
On the road to the island.
We had to walk about 2 miles from our car just to get to the island. There were TONS of people there, as I read online that over 3 million people visit a year. To put that in perspective, the Eiffel Tower has 6.9 million visitors a year. Pretty impressive tourist area in such a small amount of space. Once we got into the city, there were just people everywhere. We immediately knew we should have came at least an hour, if not two hours earlier. The island was filled with small shops and restaurants.
This is the walk to the island. Just a bit further is where the water comes up to during high tide (or so we thought).
Gorgeous, right?
The narrow streets filled with people!
In the past, it was able to stay untouched during The Hundred Years War because of the natural high tide defense. Later it became a prison, but now it is most known for its beautiful abbey located at the very top of the island. Unfortunately, the lines were super long so we were unable to visit the abbey without staying there for hours waiting in line. We had too much on the agenda for the day to wait in line for a long amount of time.
Close up of the abbey
This picture makes me laugh because we took about 6 selfies before this. A man walked up to us and asked if he could take our picture for us. We must have looked like we were struggling.
On Monday, we woke up really early to hit the road to head to the city of Eretat. We were heading about an hour and a half to Normandy's White Cliffs. We were both secretly crossing our fingers that we don't strike out again with the cliffs like we did just a couple days prior. To our surprise, we had yet another moment of awe, as this was absolutely stunning! The tide was fairly low at the time, so we went and walked down by the rocky beach. Then we started making our way to the arches, stepping over rocks of all shapes and sizes as well as mini-pools of water in between the large stationary rocks.
The view when we first walked down to the beach upon arrival
The little pools of water. So pretty. I was surprised to not see any fish or creatures though.
We climbed numerous ladders, went through a mini cave tunnel, and made our way to the arch up close. It was such an adventure climbing the ladders, guessing where we were going to end up in the end. The tunnel freaked me out for a bit, as it was dark. But luckily it was short and just a way to get to the other side of the beach. There was one spot with a ladder that was resting on the side of the cliffs. You looked up to see a small path that was basically going vertical up to the Eretat Cliff area where you could walk on top of the cliffs. It is the only way out if high tide comes...ahhhhh! So scary!
Small cave area. The ladder we climbed to reach the tunnel.
Inside the cave
The famous arch
Words cannot describe how beautiful this area was, and it made our experience at the Cliffs of Moher run for its money. It was interesting to see the warning signs around our walk around the beach, as when high tide arrives you could be "stranded" in one of the areas for up to 4 hours. The tide comes up so far that all the area we walked in would be under water. By the time we left (about an hour later) the tide was already starting to rise. We wished we could have followed the paths on top of the cliffs (you can get to them in another spot...not the scary ladder above). I could have spent more time in this adorable city, and on the beach. The weather was still pretty cold, as you can tell we have our winter jackets on. But definitely one of the mini-trips I'll remember for a long time.
One of my favorite pictures
So much green goo! We had to be careful walking along the edge (you can see the hand rail behind me) as it was so slippery!
The ladder leading up to the top of cliffs
The entrance to the cave tunnel
The safety sign
This pretty much sums up our time in Normandy, France. We had an amazing time, and I know it was one of our favorites.
On to the next adventure...
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