Sometimes I really miss living on the coast. I grew up on the North Carolina coast, and our house was a short walk from the shore and less than two miles from the ocean. We could hear the sound of surf pounding along the beach at night, when the ocean waters were rough. And we could smell low tide (marée basse in French) — it was a fishy, seaweed smell.
You won't smell that when you look at this slideshow made up of photos I took at Portbail, in Normandy, but you'll see the evidence. It runs for less than a minute.
Depending on the cycles of the moon, the difference in water level between high and low tide at Portbail, 50 miles north of the Mont Saint-Michel and 15 miles east of the Isle of Jersey, can be about 30 feet (nine or ten meters). I think I'm reading that right on this web page.
On a very low tide at Portbail and other ports along the Normandy coast, all the boats are left sitting on the muddy bottom of the bay. Meanwhile, if I'm reading this web page correctly, the difference between high and low tide in Morehead City, N.C., where I came from, is only about four feet. Oh, there's also an ancient fortified church at Portbail...
Didn't we go, in 1998, from Carteret to Portbail and Lessay on our way to the chateau of Pirou?
ReplyDeleteYes, I think we did. I remember St-Germain-sur-Ay, for example, near Lessay. I took the pictures in today's slideshow in May 2005, when Walt, Collette, and I drove up to Carteret, Barfleur, St-Vaast, etc.
DeleteFrom Lessay to Pirou we went through Créances, the carrot capital of the world!
DeleteYes, we stopped in St-Germain-sur-Ay. Somewhere I have photos of the church there.
DeleteI'm trying to remember the town where we had lunch. I think Pirou was before lunch, no?
DeleteHere is my recollection of that day. We stopped first in Portbail, then in what I think was Surville, then in St-Germain-sur-Ay. We might have had lunch between this last town and Pirou. After the visit of the chateau (in the afternoon, I think) we went to visit the church (wall paintings) at Canville-la-Roque, then to St-Sauveur-le-Vicomte and the chateau de Crosville-sur-Douve and back to Carteret. I have no recollection whatsoever where we stopped for lunch!
DeleteMy memories mostly match yours. If I could remember where we ate lunch... There isn't much between St-Germain and Pirou, for example. I'll have a look at St-Sauveur-le-Vicomte and see if that's where the restaurant was. Didn't we also go to Briquebec?
DeleteI remember that at whatever restaurant in whatever town I had an entrée of salad piémontaise.
DeleteIt looks like we didn’t go to Lessay in 98, because I know I went there only once and I found photos of Jeanine, Yolande and Frank in the church and that was in 2002. So, we might have gotten to Pirou in the morning and have a late lunch in La Haye-du-Puits or Saint-Sauveur-le-Vicomte. Yes, we went to Bricquebec, probably on our way back. It’s twenty years ago!
DeleteI'm pretty sure we went to Lessay in 1998. The only other time I went there was in 2005, with Walt. I wouldn't have known about Lessay then if I hadn't already gone there with you earlier.
DeleteNo clue how to pronounce Portbail
ReplyDeleteSomething like por-BAH-yuh. Hope that helps.
DeleteEnjoyed hearing you and CHM take a trip down Memory Lane. Old Tiger is a nice name for a boat.
ReplyDeleteI always miss living near the coast. We had that in common in our formative years. The smell and the seafood and the fresh air! Nothing like it. I think you're right about east coast tides, probably a difference of 6 feet or less. Imagine if it all drained away everyday? That's so dramatic, and your boat is out of commission for a long while.
ReplyDeleteHi Ginny, it's true about the boats. I guess they just can't get into or out of port for hours at a time, between high tides. One of the things I liked about living in San Francisco was being close to the bay and ocean, where I could smell low tide.
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