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After breakfast I explored La Place des Champs de Mars. On the far side from our hotel was a bus stop equipped with a map of the town's bus services. I discovered that we were on the right side of town for our route out. Should be no problem then. Unfortunately, on departure, my sketchy memory of a sketchy map propelled us onto the RN12, [like riding on a busy Interstate for American readers]. We pulled off at Langueux and took advantage of the retail facilities provided in such locations.

I stepped into the enormous Carrefour hypermarket and returned disorientated but in possession of the day's picnic lunch. Except the bread, Ah, back in again to la grande surface, as hypermarkets are sometimes referred to in France. Now in possession of une tradition, I was stuck in a queue behind a couple whose micro-wave oven's bar-code refused to be scanned. At last, back in the open we found our way out of the ribbon sprawl, stopping again to pick up more croissants aux amandes in Yffiniac, [B.Hinault's birthplace]. This time, of necessity, our pâtissier did not bear the artisan legend.

We turned north-east onto the busier D786 for a few kilometres down to Les Ponts- Neufs and then up again to our quiet turning to Morieux. In Morieux we stopped for café-au-lait and ate our pastries. 'Not as good as yesterday', pronounced Barbara, her mouth flecked with flaky pastry. We continued to follow the coastline without getting a view of the sea, until we descended to the marina [le port de plaisance] at Le Val André. The road wound round the harbour before forcing us back upwards towards, eventually, the main road. We were apparently off the map again and following our noses. It seemed to take too long, with too many ups and downs to reach the junction of the D786 and D17. We decided to follow the main road, by-passing Erquy until the turning for Les Sables d'Or-les-Pins. We would then follow the D34 marked in green as a parcours pittoresque [scenic route] on the map, towards Cap Fréhel.

Again, there was a descent to the centre of Les Sables a spacious and elegant town, but again with an end of season air. We thought we might picnic among the pines, but an onshore breeze put paid to that, neither of us fancied sitting in a draught. In front of us now was a long and surprisingly hard climb to the marked viewpoint overlooking Pléhérel-plage [beach]. There was an unoccupied park bench right above the beach car-park, with a view up the coast and of the nearby campsite. It was around 2-30pm so we stopped to eat the usual bread, cheese and fruit. It was sunny and the sea, a perfect blue. The chill from the onshore breeze we were able too endure for as long as it took to eat. We jumped back on the bikes and stopped at the first café, inland, sat in full sunshine in the lee of the building and ordered café-au-lait.

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We were aiming for the village of Fréhel back on the main road. From there we continued eastwards down to la Baie de la Frénaye, where with the tide out, my nostrils were filled with the less than enticing perfume of estuarial sludge. There was then a climb up to Matignon, where, while I waited for Barbara to catch up, I looked up L'Hotel de la Poste in our guide. The hotel is situated, non too picturesquely, on the edge of town, over the road from the mail sorting office and the functional community hall. We were given an upstairs room with a view of both and after enquiring about times for dinner, we slept for an hour or so.

After showers, we walked back towards the town centre where I tried some local cider before dinner. The restaurant was busy and the food, good. I ate a mixed starter, une assiette de dégustation, [a little bit of everything], magret de canard, [duck breast] cheese and a vodka and lemon sorbet, Barbara, salade de St. Jacques tiède [warm scallop salad], filet de lieu jaune, [pollock fillet] cheese, then frozen nougat with raspberry coulis.