Vannes/Meucon

Date of Visit = various

Pilot: = Alan Pound

e-mail = Alan.Pound@aculab.com

Field Report

Vannes (Meucon) is a typical immaculate French GA airfield, just North of Vannes - long runway - big concrete tower with tinted glass, and just two pairs of bent wings on the ramp... 8~) Although there is also a (perhaps daily) flight by Air Littoral, and maybe others...

Get a hotel either within the old town, or just outside, so you can walk... The old town is a wonderful medieval walled city - steep cobbled streets, numerous nooks & crannies - but it is also active and full of atmosphere and bustling life (it is not just a museum exhibit). It certainly gets its fair share of visitors, but that really means there is a totally wonderful selection of restaurants (unlimited amounts of fresh sea-food) to be had within the walls...

One of my favorite pastimes in the entire world, is on a hot Breton afternoon, sitting at one of the cafes in the Place Gambetta sipping a Leffe, overlooking the old port and watching the people wandering in and out of the Porte to the old city... totally magic (ah - the simple joys...) There is also an aquarium and a butterfly house at the Parc du Golfe (for the kids among us...), for the cost of a stroll along the side of the old port between the yachts and the quiet games of Boules beneath the plane trees....

The Morbihan is a gulf - an inland sea, full of tiny islands. One of the days you are there, if the weather is fine - plan to take a day trip on the ferry into the gulf - it stops at several islands, and depending upon the state of the tide you can get to various interesting places - even right up the estuary to Auray... There is one trip which includes a lunch stop at a restaurant on one of the islands (Arz?)

If you are there more than a couple of days, hire a car and drive around the gulf, both the northern (Carnac, Quiberon) and southern shores (Caesars Tumulus... and I can't remember the name of the little port on the southern peninsula, where you can sit on a grassy knoll and watch the tidal race in and out of the gulf...)

In addition to that, when leaving, with a little negotiation with the controller at Vannes, you can fly right round the gulf, and get a view of the stone Alignments at Carnac from the air....

You can also fly to Quiberon - there is a small strip there - or from Vannes it is quite a short hop out to sea to Belle-Isle...

Magic... Just 1:30 from Cranfield by Mooney/C340... roll on summer!