Yes, OK, these are my holiday photos, but you don’t have to look at them if you don’t want to, and there is quite a smattering of history in here …

This walk around Brittany followed paths like this, and country lanes, on what the tourist office map describes as the Circuit de Crucano and the Circuit de Sainte-Barbe, just north-east of Plouharnel. (Not a very accurate map I should warn anyone following in my footsteps, although the paths themselves are very well marked.)

The paths appear to be if not ancient (although the way they link ancient sites is suggestive), certainly historic – in fact given the presence of fountains and chapels they are certainly medieval and early modern pilgrimage routes. They are often lined with dry-stone walls and the presence of ancient apple trees unattached to buildings suggests there was once much more settlement here than there is now. There are also lots of blackberries, and it seems the French aren’t much into picking blackberries as they walk, since you don’t even need to get seriously scratched to pick as much as you can eat.

Just north of the Plouharnel Gare SCNF (no trouble crossing the rail line – it only runs July-August, in a very French way!) is the Menhir du Vieux Moulin. (“Standing stones of the old mill” – no longer in evidence). They reminded me of what the guide at the Alignements du Menec said (well she said and a friendly visiting Englishman helped me to understand – her French was tres rapide) about the menhirs at the start of each alignment tending to be placed very close together, forming almost or perhaps in fact a wall – maybe only certain people were allowed to progress beyond that.

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Part 1 is here.

… British parents seemed to be controlled by their children – you can see even quite small kids sizing up their parents and thinking “if I do this they’ll really lose it”, whereas the French adults seem in control.

6. Staying in a mobile home on a camping site isn’t at all bad. For one person lots of space, a fridge and basic cooking facilities for leisurely breakfasts, and this is a lovely spot – Camping de l’Ocean. I’ve got a “sea view” – well a glimpse of the bay between two houses provided no car is going along the road at the time, the shade a giant old fir tree that scents the air with resin, lots of birds (finches, sparrows, swallows, and some doves that appear to be under the misapprehension that this is spring), a chorus of crickets from the neighbouring field – not bad for a week for 250 euros. (Although sadly now the euro is so strong France isn’t nearly as cheap overall as it used to be.)

7. The sea temperature at this time of year is quite pleasant – cool but not bracing, at least unless you let your feet trail dow a meter or so. After that, it is cold!

* Why are there so many menhirs (standing stones)? Well no one really knows, but it seems to me that when you look at a map the primary formation – the alignments du Menec, Kermario and Kerlescan (avenues of standing stones up to 10 wide) – they clearly form a “wall”, at least a psychological wall, across the peninsula. If you wanted to say to the Mesolithic hunter-gatherers, who you’d pushed out as you started clearing the forests for agriculture “This is our bit”, then this was a pretty good way to do it.