St Michael's Mount

St Michael's Mount.....twin of Mont St Michel

Yes...there is a connection between the two in case anyone was wondering......

I was very excited to be visiting St Michael's Mount in Cornwall today. After visiting Mont St Michel while John and I were in France recently, I thought it would be a great opportunity to compare the two.

Mont St Michel, France

St Michael's Mount, Cornwall

The church on the summit of St Michael's mount was built after the Norman invasion when the island was granted to the Benedictine Abbey of Mont St Michel in France. Bernard le Bec undertook to build an Abbey similar to the other. Although this one is far less grand. It became a site for pilgrims from France to visit.

The Abbey later became a fortress used by the military during the war of the roses and the civil war. Eventually it was sold off to the St Aubyn family and Lord St Leven still resides there today although the property was handed over to the National Trust on a 999 year lease in 1954.

It was very easy to get to. No narrow roads to go down, we simply drove to Marazion, the small town on the landside  opposite St Michael's Mount. There is a massively big free car park right on the beachfront and when we arrived in the morning the tide was well out exposing a lot of beach and the paved walkway to the Mount.

We walked across, Susan in bare feet and me jumping over puddles and found a cafe near the entrance to sit with a pot of tea and dry off our feet. After talking to the ladies at the information desk, Susan wisely decided not to attempt the steep path and steps up to the Abbey, preferring instead to look around the gardens and then sit with her knitting until I got back.

It was a difficult path to walk up. Lots of uneven cobbled steps and few handrails. No disability access here! There were stunning views from the top though. You could see all the way across the bay to Penzance and watch the tourists scuttling like ants across the sand and causeway as the tide advanced.
The Abbey was extensively converted to include comfortable family accommodation during Victorian times. There were all the usual things you'd expect to see in a Great  House of that era, including lots of family portrait paintings, silverware and antiques.
In one room there is also a collection of Bronze age relics which were discovered on the island.
The Island is not as heavily built up at Mont St Michel. Much more gardens and trees, although at one time in its heyday 300 people lived on the island and there were even three schools and a pub.
Nowadays there are only 30 permanent residents. The property is well maintained and the tourists are well catered for with various shops and restaurants. There is still an operational church and services are still held regularly. There was even a secret passage under one of the seats in the apse of the church.

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Susan and I met up again and chose to eat at the restaurant nearest the small harbour. We both selected crab dishes. Mine, a chille crab linguine was scrumptious! We washed it down with elderflower presse which I'm enjoying almost as much as the sicilian lemonade we've been having here.

By the time we'd finished lunch the tide was in and the causeway was well underwater. The only way back, unless you wanted to wait for low tide again was the small motorboat taxis that were running back and forth to the mainland. These held about a dozen people at a time and they would fill up one and as soon as it left another one came in to load up.  The sea was bit choppy with waves splashing over the sides of the boat as we chugged back. I'm glad it wasn't a long trip or some people might've been seasick in that swell.

We had a brief look around shops in Marazion before driving back to Bodmin. This time we got off at the right exit and found our way with no trouble back to the farm.

Marazion