Ottawa to Paris: Mont St. Michel

Right before we visited the St. Malo Aquarium, we visited Mont St. Michel. I wrote a blog post and then managed to delete it, so here I go again.

The first church was built on this rocky isle in 708 by St. Aubert the Bishop of Avranches, a neighbouring village. St. Aubert was visited by the archangel Michael three times and told to build a church. The legend goes that he did not listen until the third time. The third time the archangel touched his head and burnt a hole right through his skull. His skull became a valued relic.

Currently all visitors must walk or take a free shuttle over a causeway to the island. They are in the process of building a lighter bridge under which the water will be able to flow. The tidal area has begun to fill in with silt and the Mont is now truly only an island during very high tides. The abbey really does look like something out of a fairytale.

It was a cold, windy, and rainy morning and our shuttle was full. On our way up to the abbey, there were a lot of people, but we could move at our own pace, and once we arrived at the abbey we could easily see all we wanted to see. On the way back down, we realized how lucky we were to arrive early. The one main street was packed with people.

There are lots of stairs up to the abbey. Our girls are great climbers, and even they found it a bit much.

The abbey was a major focus of pilgrimage. Young pilgrims used to come from very far away and there was much concern for their health and for their lives. You can still wade across the bay in the footsteps of the pilgrims.

In the 10th century the Benedictines settled in the abbey.

Our girls found the climb a bit too much and by the third room, Lillian was repeating "boring!" with every footstep.