Comfortable Five Bedroom Stone House in St. Gilles-Pligeaux, Cotes d`Armor, Brittany

Three storey Breton stone house with traditional features. 10, Rue des Fontaines includes three bedrooms that comfortably sleep 4 adults and one child’s bedroom on top grenier floor. It is situated close to centre of historic Breton village within five minutes walking distance of local store / bar. With one bathroom / WC / shower on Ground Floor and one WC/shower/washbasin cubicle on 1st Floor serving two bedrooms.

Built in the 1850s the exterior are of 600mm thick granite with internal 70mm terracotta walls. Kitchen includes snack table, gas cooker, twin sinks, washing machine, log burner and electric warm air heater with tiled floor, with fridge in room adjacent to bathroom. This and bathroom also have tiled floors. Lounge contains dining room table to seat 4, three storage cabinets for crockery, wide range of books and DVDs, wide-screen television with DVD player, two armchairs, external access door and stone fireplace and chimney.

1st Floor includes one double bedroom (Bedroom 1) with wardrobe with space for bunk beds, warm air electric heater, and access to En-Suite shower room and storage area. Also one single person bedroom (Bedroom 2) at rear with double glazed window, leather armchair, warm air heater and access to En-Suite room. In addition is a second single person front facing bedroom (Bedroom 3) with wardrobe, work table, electric warm air heater and access to top floor Grenier level staircase. All bedroom open onto staircase landing.

2nd Floor grenier level includes one child’s bedroom (Bedroom 4) with south facing Velux window, pointed stone gable end wall, and insulated pitched roof. This is separated from the rest of the grenier by a timber partition with glazed window. Remaining area of grenier includes a work room with plastered gable end wall, south facing Velux window, and pitched roof. (This area of the roof is being insulated and finished.)

The small garden across the street is approximately 1.5 m above street level with sheltering trees along its south face and contains a small allotment, timber frame garden shed for storage and a south facing sunlit sitting out area with benches. In front of this is parking space for two cars with access to the raised garden level by four concrete steps.

The village is approximately 40 minutes due south of Guingamp which has its own hospital, supermarkets and shopping facilities. 20 minutes south of St. Gilles is St. Nicolas-du-Pelem with library, large supermarket with car hire and refill facilities, bank, and small shops. The nearest garage for car repairs is in the village of Kerpert, ten minutes’ drive away.

Local interest

For the English visitor the whole area can be agonisingly beautiful and full of interest. Due south of St. Gilles, down the D767, is Corlay with its extremely picturesque lakeside castle, historic church, small supermarket and bank. Outside St. Gilles itself is a small, privately owned, chateaux inspired by te work of the architect Viollet le-Duc.

he surrounding area contains innumerable historic sites and monuments, reflecting the French respect for the past. On the D28 heading east towards Callac, itself an historic medieval town, lie numerous Druid stone menhirs visible from the roadside. There are two the ruins of two medieval Catholic abbeys in the area: the Abbe de Cote Maloehen, due north of St. Gilles, to the west of D767, which itself lies in the valley of the picturesque River Trieux. Also there is the Abbe de Bon Repos, a ruined Cistercian abbey situated west of the old Roman town of Mur-de-Bretagne, adjacent to which are Les Forges de Salles, a museum of ironworkers’ cottages. Mur-de-Bretagne itself is at the end of a log, straight Roman road and has its own electric ‘blues garage’ that meets every Thursday, Friday and Saturday. To the west of this lies a small Neolithic Stone Age hill fort concealed in the undergrowth.

Slightly north of the Abbe de Cote Maloehen is Etang Neuf, a picturesque small fishing lake at the northern edge of which is a small restaurant and adjacent Museee de la Resistance, commemorating the French Resistance movement in World War Two. In fact within St. Gilles itself is a small single room library, open every Saturday morning, built in memory of a 19 year old girl Resistance courier executed by the Milice in 1944. Due south of St. Gilles, is the equally picturesque Etang du Pellinac fishing lake with an adjacent restaurant of high standard. Further west in the countryside are innumerable small villages with artistic devices scattered along the roadside, as at Tremargat.

On the south coast at Lorient are the huge old concrete German U-boat pens now used commercially, and an adjacent submarine museum, whilst to the south-east along the coast lies Carnac with the largest collection of Druid megaliths in France, around 4,000 of them in long rows. South of Rostrenen, west of the Abbe de Bon Repos, runs the Nantes-Brest Canal, a small canal built by Napoleon to relieve besieged shipping in the port of Brest. This is now amply suitable for fishing and kayaking. Many of the trees in Brittany alongside the fields have been planted in long, straight rows at regular intervals of approximately two metres in noticeable contrast to the haphazard arrangement in England. Apparently the original reason for this was that Napoleon realised his troops, marching south to Spain and east to Italy, needed shelter from the hot southern sun. The sun in Brittany sets very late in summer, around 10.30 pm, with consequent long beautiful sunsets, but contrastingly early in winter.