Shellfishing at Locmariaquer

We awoke December 2 to the sound of cars arriving and people heading for the beach at sunrise (which is pretty late in these parts). What we initially assumed was the early morning sunrise yoga practice at Pierre Plats turned out to be scores of people in Wellies with rakes and buckets and claws, walking and wading out into the tidal flats to gather mussels, clams, and oysters. Alas, we left our clam digging gear back in Montana!


Shellfishing

Scores of people

Gleaners of the Sea...the whole village it seemed like....

A whole basket of oysters!

Pierre Plats

At the end of the Locmariaquer peninsula, out on the sand dunes, just a few feet from the sea, is the unusually large and curved Pierre Plats passage grave. After exploring, we spent the night at an aire right next to it.

Moi, there, at the entrance

Carvings on interior stones

Ditto

Double ditto

From the other end you can see the curve; also the nice menhir

marking the place

Locmariaquer

Locmariaquer is the next peninsula around, 10-15 miles by
road from Carnac; it has its own cluster of major, incredible
sites; above, a hundred meters or so away, is the Grand
Menhir of Brise, some twenty meters in length; it is not
known whether it ever stood, although both medieval and
18th century sources indicate it did; it is surely the largest
of menhirs, whether standing or not, and was moved to
Locmariquer from a quarry 3 miles or so distant...imagine
the size of the trees/rollers it would have taken (and felling
such trees with stone tools) to move this puppy...calculated
to be about 280 tons

The Grand Menhir from the entrance to the Table of Merchants;
the Table of Merchants is of great interest by itself; it is now
known that the "table" itself was part of a smilarly large menhir
that was taken down and broken up...one piece went to the
Merchants Table, one to the Er Grah tumulus (see below),
another to be the roof of Gavrinis (greatest of all these places),
3 miles away in the (now) Gulf of Morbihan; and a fourth piece
is missing

Inside the Table of Merchants

One of the side pillars in the Table of Merchants

The head piece in the Table, about 8 feet tall, carved
beautifully in shepherds' crooks (animal husbandry
being one of the hallmarks of the neolithic)

Same shot, different lighting

The ceiling of the Table of Merchants, that is, the table itself,

with its exquisitely carved 4 foot hafted axe; this is a piece

of the aforementioned chopped-up menhir

Hardly a stone's throw away from all this is

the now-uncovered tumulus of Er Grah,

unkown until quite recently; it is a 130 foot

long tumulus, with a single grave...

somebody important; and another piece of

the chopped-up menhir

Me, by pieces #2 and #3 of the Grand Menhir; it is fascinating

to imagine that the menhir culture actually predated the

tumulus and passage grave culture, that the latter had no use

for the former, all this five, six, seven thousand years ago

Kerlescan

A big megalithic day, December 1, continues; from here we

drove back east to Locmariaquer and its sites; above, the

little alignment between Menec and Kermario

Part of the Kerlescan alignment

Ditto

Cupmarks on one of the big stones

Part of the Kerlescan cromlech

The Tumulus St. Michel, in Carnac; originally there were seven

of these large tumuli scattered around, many mistaken for

natural hills

Kercado Tumulus

The Kercado tumulus and alle couverte is back in Carnac,

where we drove next, again, about a quarter mile south

of the Kermario alignment. Again, it is something we

had never seen before--always in too much of a rush, I

guess, and the Carnac area has some 30,000 megaliths

to look at. Kercado is much older than anything else in

the area, dated authoritatively to 5,000BC, the oldest

known human stone construction anywhere. I am glad

we finally got around to seeing it! Above, Kercado

tumulus, really intact, with trees on top, etc.

Vicki atop the entrance...it's not small

The tumulus has a partially-intact stone circle around it, very

unusual for Brittany

Interior stone carvings..."abstract"

Ditto; I guess they got over the realism of the

Magdalene era (cave paintings, really old)

Rondassec

Right in the middle of a residential neighborhood of
Plouharnel, still northwest of Carnac, is a pretty much intact
tumulus containing three parallel passage graves; the
Rondassec tumulus

Special parking for visitors to dolmens, menhirs, etc.

One of the covered alleys

Another

Me, exploring

Interior view

As a parapente drifts by...

Kerzeho Alignment

Near a village called Erdeven, some miles

northwest of Carnac, there are the remnants

of what would have been the largest of all

the alignments, the Kerzeho. It extended

some two miles, changing course about

midway along the route. But now, much

of it is degraded or missing. Again, no one

has the foggiest of what all this was about

except that it was very important to someone.

All of it high neolithic for these parts, 2,500-

3,500BC.

The highway goes right through the alignment...

View of the alignment

Vicki by the Geant Menhir, part of what was perhaps the

alignment's cromlech; the fallen menhir is pretty big too

Another really huge one, lightning-struck

Part of the cromlech/alignment/whatever

What the locals refer to as the "slaughter stone"

Some 20th century construction, not comparing well...

More of the alignment

And, at the foot of the Geant, another "zero" stone

Night at Kermario

We returned to the Kermario alignment for dinner and a full-

moon stroll among the stones and spent the night there too. Above,

poached salmon with my patented mustard cream caper sauce

flanked by a couple langoustines, with Muscadet wine; Vicki had

frozen pizza and was happy...

Night on the alignment

The Kermario dolmen by flash

More flash...