June 21, 2019
Erdeven to Locmariaquer
Côte des Monolithes
I packed my dew-wet tent and set off to see the some of the local megaliths by the "Sentier des Megaliths". I took the same path I'd taken yesterday back to town because the map of cycle routes wasn't detailed enough to see how else to find it and it wasn't far. I found the start, but lost it again because it's not well-marked, and then wondered if I'd gone wrong again because there was mud and no megaliths!
But then I came across this sign:
and there they were. I walked among them and took some photos, then walked my bike through them and got back on. Then there were more!
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I finally popped out on the road and decided to continue along it to figure out where exactly I was.
A couple hundred metres along and I discovered I was at the main entrance to the same campground I'd just stayed at!
I carried on to rejoin my planned route to Carnac and just before I connected with it, there was this:
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I joined up with my planned route and found myself riding between two sections of the Menec alignments. Wow! There's also a well-done visitor centre. It's small, but free, and features an informative film (with headsets to listen in English, among other languages, and even French subtitles and sign language), a gift shop that's mostly books, and a rooftop terrace for an elevated view of the alignments.
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I didn't carry on to see the other alignments; I followed my route and turned toward Carnac where I found the Saint-Michel tumulus. It must have been exciting for the archaeologists who found the burial chamber inside, as mentioned in the displays at the visitor centre, but it isn't all that exciting to visit now.
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However, my route was to Locmariaquer where it passed right by the Locmariaquer Megaliths. I had to stop and visit; this site cost 6€. Another informative film and three different things to see.
The Great Menhir Brisé was the "largest from the prehistoric age in the west." It would have reached 18.5 m above the ground when it was erected in about 4500 BCE. The unbroken block would have weighed 280 tonnes and is a type of stone not found in the immediate area. There is also evidence that there were another 18 menhirs in a row behind it. It's unknown how the huge block was moved to its location, what happened to the others, and what caused the Great Menhir to fall and break into 4 pieces a few hundred years after its installation.
The Table des Marchands dolmen is also very interesting. For centuries it was just a (large) dolmen but in the 1990s it was covered with rock as archaeologists think it would have originally been. Visitors can enter, though, and see the rear slab, thought to be a similar age to the Great Menhir and thus older than the dolmen itself, and the top slab has engravings that match up with those of the top slab of the Gavrinis dolmen 4 km away on what is now an island. It is thought that they are parts of a broken menhir and that a third part is the block covering the grave within the Er Grah tumulus.
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The Er Grah tumulus is the third megalith. It's not exciting; the burial chamber had been visible for centuries and had been ransacked long ago, one end was used as a quarry, and the rest was so forgotten a car park was built on it. It was also restored in the 1990s.
Next stop was the tourist info in Locmariaquer. I got there at 4:30 to learn that my only chance of visiting Gavrinis was on a boat that had just left. You can only go to Gavrinis with a guided tour and the only ones from Locmariaquer are on Tuesdays and Fridays. All others leave from Larmor-Baden and you can't get there from here by water except in July and August. The other option is to go to Auray to cross the river and come down the other side. Gavrinis is only 4 km away as the proverbial crow flies, but about 50 km by road. I was quite upset by this news because it was one of the sites I really wanted to visit. The best I could do was a boat cruise of the Golfe de Morbihan and since it was only a couple of Euros more to do the whole thing and go up the Auray river too, I went for that. It leaves at 10 tomorrow.
Next order of business was a place to stay. The first campground looked very clean, but wasn't really set up for tents. They had a couple of pitches but those were more for camping-cars. Almost the entire place is mobile homes. The municipal camping was just a bit further and it's not bad. I'm not the only one with a tent, but almost! The ground is really hard but a fellow who asked me how my tent was in the wind lent me a hammer.
I ate at the campground restaurant (a separate business, I understand). The food (pizza) was okay though not great but the service was indifferent. I was given a menu for dessert but nobody came to take my order. I'll eat elsewhere tomorrow. An evening walk on the beach and off to bed. It's light out until well past 10:30.
Today's ride: 35 km (22 miles)
Total: 3,053 km (1,896 miles)
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