Biking in Brittany, or, Carmen goes on her very first bike trip.

So we are back from our week excursion of France's west coast, a region they call Brittany. It is home of the Brittany Spaniel (Neesha and her man have one they call Gizmo, and now I realize it was French attitude from that little dog all the time.) Aside from cocky spaniels- :) Brittany is also home to awesome cider, gold-flecked beaches and something called a "Green Route". Akin to Austin's hike and bike around Town Lake, and yet nothing like it at all, because this one will actually take you places, and you don't have to dodge jogger moms and their rugged baby strollers. In fact, sometimes you don't see anyone at all for kilometers and kilometers.

Along the Green Route, the best way to bike around Brittany.Biking Brittany

We set off from Paris on a Tuesday. We caught a TGV train to Rennes, and then transferred to a smaller regional train for St. Malo, our starting point on the coast.

Our first regional train in France.Biking Brittany

Train travel can be real luxurious when you're an American baller. Biking Brittany

We arrived in St. Malo's tiny gare and humped it for our campground. After a sweaty walk around town, we find it on a quiet hill just above town and across the bay from the old walled city. We throw down our gear and head to town for some paella and cider, followed by a sunset walk along the city wall.

Across the bay from our campground in St. Malo.Biking Brittany

You may think it's about 800 or 900pm. You are wrong. It's more like ten.Biking Brittany

It was all very peaceful and perfect. We headed back along the seafront to turn in for the night, as the next day we wanted to get up fairly early to pick up our rental bikes. Our untrusty Lonely Planet listed the location just outside of the old town, but, just like the losers in a zombie movie, we never learn. We don't bother checking the address for ourselves, and as a reward for our stupidity, we spend half our 2nd day wandering around the newer, therefore, unquaint streets of modern St. Malo, vainly looking for our rental place. And packing about 50 lbs of gear to boot.
After about two hours of this, we get the bright idea to ask at the tourist office, which of course we had passed some time back, and even said to each other, "Do we need to go to the tourist office? Nahhh."
The tourist office turns out to be helpful! We are given an address, nearer to the gare (which is a train station) and off we go. Of course, when we get there, it is during their two hour lunch break, but that is ok. I need a lunch break too. So we lunch, and wait and at long last, around 230pm, we are finally outfitted with our rides and ready to officially get a move on.