L'Aber Wrac'h

The Voyages of Richard and Amanda
Thu 8 Jul 2010 17:36
These N Brittany names definately have too many apostrophies!! This is a fascinating place. We are both very impressed with the sailing school here with every age from about 4 to teenagers out on every sort of boat. Various different groups get towed out behind an instructor and spend a few hours learning to sail. Amanda and I have had a long discussion about whether there is anything similar in the UK. Here  so much is geared to teaching sailing, and while I act as devil's advocate and try to argue that  there is a similar structure in place, I must admit I haven't seen it in practice. There are sailing schools like the UK Sailing Academy in Cowes, and individual clubs do training but to concentrate so much resource in one spot seems to be typically French. But then the French have completely different view of sailing than we do. For them their best sailors are superstars, and in terms of racing big boats the French probably lead the world.
 
Today we walked a couple of kilometres up the hill to the nearest supermarket to stock up on a few essentials to keep us going for the next couple of days. As we got higher up the we began to get an ever increasing view of the coastline and it is truely magnificant with rocky islands and breaking waves throwing surf up into the air. It makes us realise what a privilege it has been to be on this amazing journey where we have seen so much and given us a hunger for more.
 
We've decided that depending on tomorrows weather forecast we will do one more overnight crossing and head North to Falmouth. Then work our way eastwards to Plymouth, Salcombe, Dartmouth and Poole. So tonight might be our last night in France. Although it would be an experience to visit more of the harbours along this coast we need to save some of them for a later day.