Last Saturday, 6 September we motored over to the hamlet of Kerio, hard by Rohan to stay for three nights in the yard of a house Chris & Joyce had rented. They are keen bicycletists with the intention to pedal the whole damn thing, but in sensible reaches. Started by Napoleon, sensibly using Spanish prisoners-of-war, the canal was not completed until near the end of the July Monarchy in 1842, I think. the canal is wide, with very modern looking metal gates and paddles. Between each of a run of locks there are huge basins, now havens of wild-life.
Helpfully, the canal connects lovely old French towns such as Josselin where a fine chateau dominates the view. Henri IV has a connection with this place and the family were leading Protestants. As king it was Henri IV who had enacted
The Edict of Nantes in 1598 giving Prods legal protections. On Louis XIV revocation of said Edict in 1685 the situation of the Protestants deteriorates rapidly - and that was after the so-called 'Wars of Religion'. Needless to say, despite the Edict of Nantes, in the reign of Louis XIII,
Richelieu had the chateau effectively sacked.
We dine over-looking the canalised river and Chris has a splendid view of the chateau.
In the afternoon we walk through its gardens to see and smell the scent of magnificent ancient varieties of rose.
And we look out over ramparts at the town below.
We were in fact waiting for the French guided tour of the rez-de-chausée only. Here in beautiful French we were told many beguiling and romantic tales of olden times and not one single world of why, perhaps, those happier far-off times were swept away on a tide of misguided liberty, equality and fraternity. Still there's no tourist industry in Marxist analysis.
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