Dinan + Bon Repos

Dinan is a nicely preserved town, with narrow streets and attractive old buildings. We climbed the clock tower for great 360 degree views.

Then we went to the Creperie du Puits, where we had the best crepes of our trip — I had a smoked duck fillet crepe and Camilla had a ham and mushroom one. Camilla did some work on her laptop and we wrote postcards; there were three open wifi networks.

With Camilla navigating, we took a bit of roundabout route to St Meen Le Grand, where we had a quick look at the Abbaye. Then we headed west, not entirely sure where we would be staying the night.

With some help from our guidebooks, we ended up in the Abbaye de Bon Repos. The old abbey itself is in ruins, though being restored, but the attached manor house holds a small restaurant and hotel. There was no one there when we arrived, so we used up the time till they got back by driving to the nearby Salles des Forge, a traditional iron-making village, which was closed.

After settling into our room, we looked around the abbey ruins and then had dinner. This was really excellent — in fact the best meal of the trip. Together with the crepes we'd had for lunch, it was an excellent food day!

After dinner we walked a little along the Nantes-Brest canal, which runs by the abbey, and admired some bright orange slugs. We were inspired by a sign about a 120km cycleway "Le chemin du Petit Train", from Carhaix to St Méen-le-Grand.

Saturday 23rd June

A lot of morning light came through the little round window of our room. After breakfast, we drove out to the Lac de Guerlédan, where we stopped at a vantage point over the lake. We then finished a counter-clockwise loop around the lake, via Mur-de-Bretagne, before resuming our westward progress on the N164.

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