Hail Mary, full of grace
As summer winds relentlessly on, Barfleur becomes more and more alive with visitors and holidaymakers.
While nights on the promontory behind the church are silent and still, just like the rest of the year, daytime is very different now the season is in full swing. It's a week until the funfair arrives, and yet another until the annual antiques salon, but Barfleur feels busier than ever before.
Step left onto the port, and tourists mob the Café de France, step right and the beach is full of chattering families and water sports lovers, often there's solitary yacht at anchor in the bay.
The "church" beach in town
Meanwhile at Nettie, Stéphane and the team have finished creating the compact bathroom shell on the first floor, and are preparing the ground floor room for the kitchen/diner.
The slightly unorthodox arrangement before, and clean white walls after
I had planned to work alongside the trades, repointing the upstairs room, sanding floors and plastering. It's become clear however that there's really only room for one set of workers – negotiating Nettie's winding stairs with tools, buckets of plaster and the other ephemera of renovation works is going to be troublesome with four of us in the house.
So during the past week or so, before our annual exodus to Marseille, I've taken myself off on solitary wanders around the Normandy countryside, with just a guide book and some headphones for company. I've learned a lot – helpful information panels are scattered around, describing local features, farming methods and how the bocage (network of lanes and fields) was constructed.
This part of France came alive after the hundred-years war with England. Merchants poured into Normandy, keen to exploit the rich terrain and trade in products like linen and wheat. To show off their wealth, they constructed large manor houses and farmsteads – beautiful buildings, sometimes fortified with moats and ramparts quietly impressive in gentle yellow stone and pink granite.
While farming remains prosperous here, I doubt any of the local landowners would be able to afford to build such splendid homes today. They still get to enjoy living in lovely old houses though, very reminiscent of English vernacular architecture.
Home Farm
The portion of the wall above these lintels is more recent – the building would have been thatched until insurers put a stop to straw roofs and they reconstructed using tile.
I don't meet any other walkers in all of the 100 miles I've wandered in the past ten days. The lovely, rounded tunnels of the bocage with distant views of a sparkling sea are there just for me, and the occasional animals I encounter. Despite two months of dry weather, the ground still feels damp and fertile and the lanes are buzzing with life.
What a luxury it is, to live in such peaceful times and be alone and unhindered, with just thoughts and music for company.
A peaceful lane of the bocage
As well as the natural beauty, there's evidence of a deeply spiritual life in every village. Norman churches are elegant, tall and angular, and a familiar shape; the Normans imported their architecture when they invaded England a thousand years ago.
Just a thousand year-old cross
In a tiny and otherwise unremarkable hamlet, I came across an "oratory", a kind of miniature prayer room, with a recess painted a Mediterranean turquoise and housing a statue of the virgin and her baby, all decked about with plastic flowers and candles.
How lovely to find this intact relic anchored on a hillside, buffered by the elements but still standing (and obviously frequented), providing comfort to parishioners for 300 years and pleasure to solitary pilgrims like me in these dog days of August.
