Ken's Blog

History has not been kind to Marie Antoinette. It’s quite possible she never actually uttered the immortal words ’Let them eat cake’. Even if she did, it was probably brioche, a type of bread, rather than cake, that she mentioned. Not that would have made much difference to the lot of the starving peasants.

Despite the controversy, I do have some sympathy for Marie Antoinette. Riding into the medieval town of Pontrieux I discover that whilst object d’art are plentiful, simple foodstuffs are much more elusive. Pity really, especially when you’re a hungry, and you’ve a cunning feeling that most shops in France are about to close for a couple of days.

Then, hidden amongst the many boutiques, art galleries, bistros and creperies, I find a combined boulangerie and patisserie (bakery and cake shop). So, I to am obliged to eat cake – chocolate eclairs – deux to be precise – well, trois would have been piggish. Perhaps then Marie Antoinette had also been cycling in Brittany. We will never know for sure.

I imagine Roscoff is quite a pleasant port. Unfortunately, in the dark and damp I really couldn’t tell. Besides I had enough to contend with, getting to grips with riding on the wrong side. I was glad I’d had the sense to invest in a right-hand drive bike.

Despite the gloom, the ride to the medieval town of Morlaix, winding along the estuary, was very pleasant. I wandered briefly around the town, looking for a cafe. It was still very early and none were yet open. Just ’Bar Tabacs’. Too soon to start drinking I thought.

Finding a small supermarket in the village of Plouezoc’h I decided it was time to take the plunge and impress the locals with my language skills. Struggling at first with an unfamiliar dialect – I think they call it fluent – far removed from my school boy comedy French, a very perceptive chap suggested a useful phrase for my admittedly limited repertoire might be ’Je parle tres peu le francais’ (’I speak a little French’). I much preferred this to the offering of my little phrase book which suggested ’Parlez-vous anglais?’. Apparently this roughly translates as ’I can’t be bothered to make any effort to speak French’.

So, what of Brittany? Mostly twinned with Devon and Cornwall. Not flat, except perhaps the runways. And quite a few similarities with Wales and the Welsh language. Like bilingual road signs – French and the regional Breton language. Except nobody’s got around to painting out the French. Then there’s the expression ’Ty’ – in Welsh this means home, similar to its meaning in Breton. There’s even a small village called St Dogmel, close to the regional town of Lannion, just as St Dogmaels is to Cardigan back in Wales.