Cruising the west coast of Brittany

Piers

Piers

Well-Known Member
Joined
2 Jun 2001
Messages
3,599
Location
Guernsey, Channel Islands
www.playdeau.com
We are planning to criuise from the Channel Islands, along the north coast of Brittany to Oussent before dropping S / SE with a destination of Saint Nazaire where my wife's Dad was involved in the great raid on the sub pens in WW2.

Can anyone guide us on ports / marinas once we have turned S/SE?
 
Westward Ho !

From Guernsey the easiest is Trebeurden which with a call ahead should be able to accomodate you, a lovelly spot for a day or two.

An easy hop to L'Aberwrach and you would probably lie on the outer floating breakwater which is quiet sheltered and should be ok. Another nice spot.

Choose your tides well and then around the corner to Camaret a lovelly spot for a day or two or into the brand new Brest Le Chateau Marina about 8 miles away in the old naval port, this will take enormous super yachts, also the cheapest diesel fuel I saw last year.

Then around the corner again, e went into Audierne you will need to phone ahead for a hammer head a nice spot this would break your journey if you are slow running. Good for a day or two.

Then you have the pick: Benodet, Port de la Foret and Concarneau. Concarneau is a gem with a medieval walled town in the middle well worth a few days, I dont know Benodet but Port de la Foret is a nice quiet marina with a lovelly beach.

This link may be of use for Beaucette tides and a basic marina guide :

http://www.digimap.gg/marinas

Pilotage books :
North Biscay Ouessant to la Gironde Adlard Coles/ Nick Heath

West France Cruising Companion by Neville Featherstone

Also Bloc Marine French Almanac available at your local ship yard.

Ps how is the thruster?

David
 
What a great guide, David. Thank you. Now I know what the Bloc is....

Lin and I will look at the charts this coming weekend and start planning.

We draw 1.53m. What did you draw, and how long were you away for when you did the trip?

Piers
 
2009

We were away for three weeks only and we did
Gsy to Trebuerden
Trebeurden to L'Aberwrach
L'Aberwrach to Camaret
Camaret to Brest le Chateau to collect son and take on fuel
Brest to Audierne
Audierne to Concarneau
Concarneau to Port la Foret
Port la Foret to Camaret
Camaret to Brest to drop off son ( train station) and fuel
Brest to Trebeurden
Trebeurden to Guernsey

Seriously dont go at the same time as me, I attract the **** weather!

I draw 1.45 and cruise 19knots

You need to hit the Raz du Four just nort of Brest and the Raz du Sein South of Brest by Audierne at Slack water, Going south you cant do both on the same tide but you can going north.

I emailed you a list of charts.
 
Thanks for the info

Thanks for the routing you took, David. So helpful.

By the way, I sent an email to your M&G email account, and it returned unable to deliver since your mail box at M&G was full !
 
Once through Chenal Du Four Camaret is the best first stop, the outer marina will take your boat or you can anchor off free as we do. Camaret has a good supermarket, long walk from outside marina or take the dinghy with enough tide to a nearby slip. From Camaret there is a short cut, Chenal de Toulinget, towards The Raz (Le Raz de Sein) and onwards south. North of the Raz are Morgat and Douarnenez, we like Morgat but prefer it going northbound. Space for big boats is limited but they are very helpful and again anchoring off is OK.

South of the Raz to St Nazaire:-

Audierne - pretty but missable, access is tide limited.
Benodet - pretty river, like the Dart but the town doesn't inspire.
Concarneau - walled city, touristy but very nice, good shops & markets
Isles De Glenan - lovely islands, some moorings or anchor, no facilities. Un-missable.
Isle De Groix or Lorient - don't excite me, might others

Then in Quiberon Bay:-

Port Haliguen - some like it, I'm not a real fan, long way to shops
La Trinite - I like it, passable shops, good fish market on the marina.
Port Du Crouesty - touristy but I like it, good shops.

The Quiberon Bay area Islands

Belle Isle - Le Palais or Sauzon, moorings or anchor off, Le Palais has an inner basin. Lots of pretty anchorages in good weather.
Houat - small island, anchor or some moorings off harbour, lovely place, un-missable, even has two small mini market shops.
Hoedic - smaller island still, anchor only harbour dries

Inside Morbihan:-

Auray River, right up to Auray (yachts beware mast height for bridge)
Auray river, Le Bono anchor or visitor buoy, pretty spot
Umpteen Islands and channels to explore and anchor.
Vannes - walled city, very pretty but locked entry.

Enjoy!
 
Hi Robin,

The more I see about this area the more I wonder why on earth I've never tried it before.

Thanks for the info. We'll be poring over the charts during the next few days and coming up with an outline plan. Can't wait.

Timing-wise, I suspect we'll leave towards the end of Jun and take a reasonable number of weeks to explore and take in the beauty of Brittany.

Piers
 
This will be the first year for 22 years we are NOT going as we just sold our boat pending a move to live aboard a trawler yacht in the USA. Southern Brittany to me is really lovely. Once past the tide gates of Chenal Du Four and Le Raz and south of Penmarc'h the tides are ignorable even sailing and the difference between best and worst times to depart are minutes not hours, even if you could work them out.

First visits most people will spend in marinas and harbours as there is plenty to see and do, but there is so much more to this area than that. We spent most of our time after the first year or two there anchoring off the many delightful islands and beaches going 'in' as little as once every 5 or 6 days for laundry and stockups.

If you have schoolboy French or better then the French Pilotes Cotiers are superb pilot books and Bloc Marine's 'Votre Livre De Bord' almanac is a must anyway, with charts, harbour plans and information in English as well.

We always preferred to go there via Dartmouth then straight over to Camaret (about 144mls), it helped with the wind angle for us but also avoided going west along the North Brittany coast with the strong tides, going west you get less time of favourable tides than going east. We usually returned along the North Brittany coast, L'Aberwrac'h to Perros Guirec (we like it) and or Treguier, St Peter Port and either home or via Alderney and or Cherbourg. I'm not a fan of Trebeurden like some as I think it is expensive and has little to offer in the way of shops or restaurants. I could understand however that going both ways via St Peter Port for fuel fill ups would be a priority for powerboats.

Robin
 
Piers said:
Hi Robin,

The more I see about this area the more I wonder why on earth I've never tried it before.

Thanks for the info. We'll be poring over the charts during the next few days and coming up with an outline plan. Can't wait.

Timing-wise, I suspect we'll leave towards the end of Jun and take a reasonable number of weeks to explore and take in the beauty of Brittany.

Piers
Click to expand...

Hi Piers, we took Eos down to the Gironde last year, spent 4 months away in total. Had a fabulous time, mostly great weather and sea conditions. Having the time to stay moored up when the forecast looked a bit iffy took all the pressure off. Hopefully you can do the same.

We started in Guernsey to fuel up and meet up with friends, and then went on to Trebeurden, which like Robin didn't really inspire us. In fact I we had our worst meal of the whole trip there in the small cafe/restaurant with the large decking area. Interesting looking out to sea at low tide. We won't be in any hurry to go back. On our trip home we anchored in the channel between the Ile de Batz and Roscoff. We had our best meal of the whole trip on Batz at the hotel at the end of the harbour leading down to the long wall where the ferries land, £15 for 3 courses, excellent quality and fab views.

We also like L'AberWrach, the wave breaker pontoon is wide and very stable with great views down the river. The sunsets have to be seen to be believed. A good walk up the hill into town is worthwhile, some nice bars, a decent supermarket and great butchers.

Camaret was Ok but I wouldn't hurry back there, but the supermarket is very good. From there we went to the Glenans, like a small version of Scilly. We loved it. In fact we loved all the islands. Belle Isle is great, Houat was the highlight of the whole trip, just the best beach I've ever seen. We didn't stay in Benodet but acros the water in St Marine, everyone recommended we did that and we weren't disappointed. Concarneau was well worth visiting, the walled city is fascinating. Audierne was interesting, would only enter towards high water, you'll see what I mean if you go there and look at the channel at low water!! But you need to know that there's a hammerhead free or you'll have to turn round and leave. The town is rather run down with not much to recommend it.

Haliguen we liked, great bike riding around the Quiberon peninsula and one of the best smaller open air markets we found. The Morbihan was fascinating, we found a great anchorage just off Ile Longue, between there and Gavrinis. Rode out a gale there with no problems. Another good anchorage was at the top end of Ile aux Moines (the largest island with public access) just off Ile Holarve. Both these were recommended by a lovely French chap who had a house on the river going up to Auray. We also stayed on the pontoons just of the main town on Moines, great to sit and watch the comings and goings but be VERY careful about depths, I decided to vacate the pontoon as we approached springs as I thought we might ground. And the bottom is all rock as a yacht coming in to the pontoon found to his cost as he grounded twice! The South cardinal buoy was somewhat misleading!!

We spent the best part of a week on fore and aft moorings in Le Bono, a lovely little town with some great restaurants. When you turn right to go into le Bono don't be too concerned about the lack of depth, it does get deeper again (we turned round the first time!) and carry on under the high road bridge and you'll see the visitors moorings ahead of you. We went by car to Auray and Vannes, both very scenic places and well worth the effort of visiting.

Sorry this is in no particular order. If you're planning on going further down then there's planty of other good spots, but if we go back we'd plan to stay in the bay of Quiberon, Hoedic we want to see but didn't this time around. The bay is pretty well sheltered from almost all directions with a huge choice of places to go and see. The islands are magical, I'm sure you'll enjoy every moment. PM me if I can help with any other info.
 
Always found Robin's advice really helpful. I would add the Belon and Villaine Rivers as great places to visit. The Belon Harbourmaster got us two fresh baguettes in the morning and refused our attempts to pay!
 
Piers said:
What trawlers are you looking at, Robin?
Click to expand...

Our shortlist favours Defevers and budget dictates mid-late '80s ones. We looked over a really lovely Defever 49 RPH (Raised Pilot House) last year but it was too early for us to buy and it is now sold. Also like the Defever 48 built on the same hull as the 49 and as owned by LJS and the Defever 44 with a flush and covered sundeck is also liked, we looked over several of those last year. These are all displacement trawlers, twin engines and usually Ford Lehman 135hp models. There are others like Nordhaven we liked but are to pricey and the Grand Banks which we like but not as much as the Defevers, plus they tend to have big engines and I'd prefer not to have teak decks.

We have also looked from afar at the Endeavour Powercat 44 catamarans, ugly things by comparison to the Defevers but with 2 x 370hp Yanmars capable of running economically at 8kts yet can do 16-18kts whilst still breaking the 1ml per gallon (USA gallon at that) limit. I suspect this will be a passing idea but it bears looking at. It does have some other advantages, like 3ft draft and both props and rudders are in tunnels so it can take the ground easily for a cheapo scrub and paint job.

We plan to be based in Hampton Va on the southern Chesapeake. SWMBO wants to work and top up her USA Social Security funds as she has been away 22 years and needs a couple more years of contributions to get her pension topped off. After that we will be more mobile either snowbirding up/down the East Coast and Intracoastal or maybe doing 'The Loop' circuit up through New York then Canada, across the Great Lakes to Chicago then down on through the middle rivers and out into the Gulf of Mexico, then via the Gulf Intracoastal or outside down the west of Florida, round the end or through the Okey Cokey whatsit to east Florida and return north up the Intracoastal to Chesapeake round trip is 6,000mls with a couple of detours!

It will seem strange after 45 years with a mast and sails, but hey ho nothing's perfect!:) The boat will be our only home so we have to make a good choice as we'll be living with that choice a long time we hope.
 
You will be living one of my dreams....

I have no probs with a max of 8 knots - that's all we do in our Fleming, so a single lower power engine woulf be fine for us. The only potential drawback is if the draft is greater.
 
Hi Piers,

Saint Nazaire is well worth a visit especially to tour the submarine pens, some may find the area a little industrial, as an alternative a short Taxi/hire car away is the all tide access Pornichet Marina in the busy seaside resort of La Baule .
 
Piers said:
You will be living one of my dreams....

I have no probs with a max of 8 knots - that's all we do in our Fleming, so a single lower power engine woulf be fine for us. The only potential drawback is if the draft is greater.
Click to expand...

We motored our sailing boat at 6.5kts cruise although it was capable of up to 8.5 flat out and we sailed at 7.5-8.5kts and more with the right wind, so a trawler at 8kts will seem quick enough. We might even drop that a tad to 7kts in the interests of minimising fuel use.

The Defevers seem to have drafts around 5ft or just under which seems shallow after the near 7ft we are used to! However the Erie Canal I think has a 5ft max limit or they won't let you in, so touch and go in it's true meaning! It is possible to detour this bit but it would be a shame as it is very pretty. The Defevers we are looking at are all in twin engine option only and the manouverability of that appeals because for some reason not that many USA boats have bow thrusters fitted.

I really like the look of Flemings too but out of our price range, even over there.

Do you have stabilisers on your Flemming? It seems they are very much valued over there and about 40% in our size band have them. The brokers told us it is difficult to sell one without them.
 
I hope to cruise the Morbihan area in the summer too, but my French is barely rudimentary - not even up to schoolboy. Am I likely to have a torrid time of it when trying to get berths in marinas, or are they more tolerant of ignorant Anglais in this area than in Paris and the rest of France?

What strategies have you employed when trying to get a berth in this area?
 
strakeryrius said:
I hope to cruise the Morbihan area in the summer too, but my French is barely rudimentary - not even up to schoolboy. Am I likely to have a torrid time of it when trying to get berths in marinas, or are they more tolerant of ignorant Anglais in this area than in Paris and the rest of France?

What strategies have you employed when trying to get a berth in this area?
Click to expand...

Never seems to be a problem as the French are better linguists and most harbour staff speak English. Weather forecasts are put up in harbour offices in English as well as French in many places, so they are much more foreigner friendly than those here are to the French.
 
To help with French words, I've been adding to the 'dictionary' I keep on Play d'eau. Words which I find useful when speaking with a Harbour Master....

Draught Tirant d’eau
Pontoon finger Cat way
Hammer Head Le bout de pontoon
Free Flow Flot libre
HW Pleine mer (PM)
LW Basse mer (BM)
Springs Vive eau (VE)
Neaps Morte eau (ME)
CD (chart datum) Zero des cartes

And when it come to spelling something,

a ah
b bay
c say
d day
e ayre
f eff
g shay
h ash
i ee
j jee
k kah
l el
m em
n en
o auh
p pay
q koo
r air
s ess
t tay
u ooh
v vay
w doobler vay
x iks
y eegrek
z zee
 
You must log in or register to reply here.

Share this page

Top