On Tuesday we took our one and only Norman day trip.
The trip was about an hour and half in our nine passenger Volkswagen van. It’s a gem of a vehicle that I wish was available in the United States. It would be a nice middle ground option between a minivan and fifteen passenger behemoth.
We do have one child who is subject to carsickness, so ... there was one extended stop to ‘tour’ a local field. The crop was nothing I had ever seen before, though -- more golden even than wheat, with a small, bowl like heads. Despite trying to research it later, I couldn’t come up with any clear leads on the crop.
The trip took us through some great countryside and actually across some of the route for the Tour de France, which had been held recently. There were vestiges of the tour in the form of signs, road makers and little French towns done all up for the occasion.
Then we arrived at our destination -- Mont Saint Michel. We arrived on the first day the site had been open to the public after an extended strike by the local merchants, who were upset about a new arrangement for parking and shuttling visitors to the town. It was clearly a setback for their business, so, of course in France you strike! But I was really glad the strike had ended because this is not a place to miss.
Words do not do Mont Saint Michel justice, not even photos. It is a perfect feudal town contained within defensive walls and surrounded by a tidal flat. A high fog was still lingering when we arrived so at first view, the abbey in the center of the town was shrouded in mist. From a distance it seemed like Avalon, a place on the very borderlands of high faery.
As we approached and the vision became clearer, it was not hard (though a bit anachronistic) to imagine knights riding out on quest from the gates.
Inside, the crowded lower streets wind their way around the base of the cliffs. There are shops, alleys, restaurants, hotels, graveyards, parks and stairways -- stairways everywhere.
But as we ascended, the crowds thinned out somewhat. We stopped for a while in a park to listen to concert. We ate our lunch in another small sitting area overlooking the tidal flats. Eventually we made it to the Abbey itself and into the beautiful cloister, featured in Terrence Mallick’s To the Wonder.
There were many places of surprising solitude and calm throughout the town, but especially in the abbey. Great pillars underground. A water wheel pulley system. Small but verdant gardens. Simple works of religious art. And the still mist shrouded cloister.
We caught no glimpse of any members of the religious order that has occupied the Abbey since 2001 -- the Monastic Fraternities of Jerusalem. The abbey itself actually has an interesting religious history. It was shut down as a monastery following the French Revolution and only saw the return of any religious orders in 1966. At present, though the monks are allowed to carry on their religious life, the abbey is still owned by the state.
After descending, we decided to venture out onto the tidal flats and walk around the mount barefooted -- another exquisite experience that is barely relatable. An expanse of mud, glittering now as the sun finally broke through. Small stone chapels and hermitages. Hewn staircases leading down to the water. Coming around the other side. Washing feet. Heading home.
That evening, Jen and I wandered into Bayeux for dessert.
A magical day indeed.
Day 20 Reflection One
Visiting Mont Saint Michel was an instance of something I had experienced several times before -- the awakening to the reality of a landmark or historic site that can come only through its geographic context. The most striking of these have been my first visit to South Bend, IN, (seeing the golden dome of Notre Dame emerge as if magic out of the midst of cornfields), visiting the Alamo for the first time (turning the corner of an ordinary San Antonio street and running into … the Alamo?), and this visit to Mont St. Michel.
Each of these was different. My notion of Notre Dame had led me to expect something a little grander of South Bend. The Alamo was an utter shock, as I had always imagined the site in a Texas desert setting.
But with Mont Saint Michel, what was surprising was the sheer amount of full human life going on. The town, the shops, the hotels, the post office and police station. Though almost exclusively tourist oriented, the town swarmed with people doing all manner of things. I had previously thought of it only as an abbey -- an exclusively religious site.
It would have been easy to be put off by the ‘secular’ bustle. (Rick Steves even calls it “grotesquely touristic”). However, I think this is a misunderstanding. As Steves even points out, “It’s some consolation to remember that, even in the Middle Ages, this was a commercial gauntlet, with stalls selling souvenir medallions, candles, and fast food.”
What I had expected was a religious site in the modern sense -- something apart from the secular. What I found was a location that pre-dated the distinction. A microcosm of old Christendom. As such it was a revelation.
As I write this, I am put hopefully in mind of Peter Leithart’s recent article in First Things, “Micro-Christendoms.”
Day 20 Reflection Two
Unlike the rest of the churches in Europe that we visited (with the possible exception of Hallgrímskirkja), the location of the church on a great central height really did make the approach seem like a pilgrimage. In Paris, wandering in and out of churches at street level created a completely different feel.
There is something about an ascent.
I suspect Mallick was keenly aware of this in using Mont Saint Michel for the setting of To the Wonder.
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