Photo mash-up #44

Today's theme will be: plants by the sea shore :-)

Happy sea shore plants day!

Suscinio castle

Another nice discovery around Vannes: the Suscinio castle. 

The castle is very interesting itself, with numerous rooms to visit and entertaining events (from archery lessons with costumed people, to magical rendering of Merlin, Broceliande and the Knights of the Round Table stories). 

But the surroundings are just as amazing: there is a natural reserve where you can observe wildlife such as seaside birds and plants. There are guides at the castle who organize special excursions to this close-by reserve, presenting the different species to visitors with the help of field glasses :-) 

View on Suscinio castle

Sand path near the castle

Pied avocet

Sailing

The Morbihan region has a long sailing history, as you can see from the pictures below: from the harbour as a starting point, to a wrecked boat on the shore :-( 

Quiet waters near the harbour

Little sailboat

Abandonned ship

Carnac

One of the places near Vannes that one should not miss is Carnac: the city of the menhirs :-)

There are many menhirs (standing stones) or dolmens (lying stones) in Brittany, but Carnac is one the most infamous places regarding this topic due to its alignments site. Carnac is the region with the highest concentration of megaliths in the world! 

Unfortunately the weather was not so good that day, so I could not manage to take a lot of pictures of the stones... 

Menhirs field

Alignments of the Petit Ménec

Little menhir and heather

Half-timbered

Vannes is also very renowned for its numerous half-timbered houses. Most of them are now painted in very colorful shades, such as deep red, yellow or green :-) 

Vannes et sa femme

Half-timbered houses

Little lights in medieval street

Ancient sailboat sign

Trip to Vannes

My second trip to Brittany this year :-) 

I had not yet explored the southern part of Brittany, and Vannes area was truly amazing! A little more difficult to explore by foot as compared to Paimpol for instance, but the travel efforts were definitely worth it. The ancient ramparts especially were impressive: Vannes has preserved most of its fortifications, which started to be built in the third century. 

View on the ramparts

Balistraria in the ramparts

Machicolation

Tour du Connétable from the ramparts