Guérande is not exactly a deserted village, but its streets are, at midday, as lone and silent as though its population had not been in residence for many months. This is a notable feature in many small French towns during the hour and a half of the midday meal, but nowhere else is it more to be remarked.
The old parish Church of St. Aubin of Guérande has a collection of strangely carved capitals depicting horrible chimerical beasts, and the Chapel of Notre Dame de la Blanche—a fine work of the thirteenth century—is occasionally the scene of a marriage wherein the participants dress themselves in the old-time resplendent costumes. Such an occasion is rare, but should one be fortunate enough to meet with it, he will carry away still another memory of the mediæval flavour still lingering about this somnolent little Breton city.
Seaward beyond Guérande are only Bourg de Batz and Croisic, a gay little maritime city with a fine Gothic church of the highly ornamented species, and many old, high-gabled houses of the variety which one sees frequently in stage settings. There are the local watering-places, too, of the Nantais, Ste. Marguerite and Baule, which have nothing of interest, however, for the traveller who seeks to improve his mind and amuse himself simultaneously. They are undoubtedly of great healthful and economic value to Nantes and St. Nazaire, however, and they do not differ greatly from others of their class elsewhere.
Again returning to the highroad, if one be travelling by road, “Vous prenez le chemin de Vennes” (Vannes) “par la Roche Bernard qui est aussy celuy de Rhennes et de Rhedon,” wrote a sixteenth-century chronicler, and the direct road to-day lies the same way. It is known as “National Road” No. 165.
Straight as the crow flies, but now up and now down, like all Breton roadways, this highway runs from Nantes to Quimper, 232 kilometres.
The aspect of the country changes perceptibly as one leaves Savenay on the way to the real Brittany. One crosses the Vilaine by the suspension bridge of La Roche-Bernard, hung so perilously high that the great three-masted coasters may pass beneath. It is unlovely, but convenient, and saves a round of fifty kilometres on the journey, as one goes from Nantes to Vannes, so it may be pardoned.
