Le Mont Saint Michel – place of the galloping tides

About 2 hours traveling west down from the Normandy Beaches which set the scene for the World War 2 D Day landings and liberation of Europe is a magical sight.  Rising from the water is a mount upon which sits a massive Benedictine Abbey.

Le Mont Saint Michel

Benedictine monks made the Mont their home in the year 996.  In 1066 the Romanesque church of the Abbey was built.  Many underground crypts and chapels had to be built to compensate for the weight of the traditionally ecclesiastical architecture whereby the church form takes on the four arms of a cross.    Feudal wars in France in the early 1200s resulted in significant damage to the Abbey.  Major renovations were finished by 1228 in the new Gothic style.

Towering La Mont Saint Michel

A statue of Saint Michael stands at the highest point of the Mount and the abbey is still a point of pilgrimage.  Funnily enough, after the French Revolution and about a hundred years thereafter, the Abbey served as a prison for radical political prisoners.  Contributing to the mystery of the place, the bay surrounding the Mount is subject to the biggest tidal ranges in Europe.  During Spring tides the water can recede up to 25 km and when the tide turns the sea has been described as rushing back into the bay at the pace of a galloping horse.