The MOJO Family: Mont Saint Michel, France

Mont Saint Michel

Have you ever heard of Mont Saint Michel? It’s an incredibly popular tourist attraction that’s technically in Normandy, but right on the Brittany border… West of Paris by a couple of hours. It’s an abbey that sits on top of a huge rock just off shore, so at high tide the abbey and village on the rock appear to float in the water that sits all around it. At lower tides, the whole island is surrounded by sand / mud flats, with just one small road coming and going.

We checked out of our little apartment in Saint Malo at about 8:15am, hopped in our rental car, and drove to the Mont Saint Michel parking. It’s about a 45min drive, and we stopped at a grocery store on the way to pick up picnic supplies / snacks. We parked at about 9:15am and got on the shuttle bus. It cost 10 euros to park our car, but then the shuttle bus was included.

There are pros and cons to traveling as a family throughout the school year. Today, a Monday in October, we definitely appreciated how lucky we were to be visiting this historic and popular place without all the summer or weekend crowds. The weather was pleasant enough – it didn’t rain!

It took a few minutes on the shuttle bus and then we walked up the “Grand Rue” and the steep steps to the top of the little island. We had talked before hand about our plan to go straight to the top and ignore all the other shops and attractions on the way. We had pre-purchased tickets for the Abbey and had a 10am entrance slot. (Cost to enter the abbey = 11 euros per adult, kids <18 yrs old are free). We arrived at about 9:50am and there wasn’t any line at all. There were other tourists, and as the day went on, more and more bus groups arrived, but we never felt crowded or waited in any lines. I’m certain that in July it would be a totally different experience.

On the shuttle bus from the parking lot to the village itself

The one road in/out of the village for the shuttle bus and service vehicles

The Abbey is at the top

I love draw bridges!!

The "Grand Rue"

Cool views of the surrounding sand as we climb up

It is a steep climb of many steps to the top

You can just make out the gold statue of Saint Michel on the top of the steeple.
Rachel attends St. Michael's school now and I went for 12 years growing up...

I love the little connecting covered bridge in the air above Rachel

At the entrance, past the ticket area

We toured the Abbey – the amazing views of the bay from the Western Terrace, the beautiful cloister area, a great hall, different areas for prayer, large pillars and small pillars and crypts. It’s fun to start at the top and then wind your way slowly downhill as you explore room after room, imagining the lives of the nuns and priests throughout the years.

Can you see the shadow of the abbey steeple on the sand below?

The cloister area

Pretty nice view out the windows of the cloister

We laughed at the funny old toilet system

Corinthian columns

The next photo shows a giant wheel, rope and sledge. The second photo below shows a chain going down the edge of the Abbey wall toward the entrance to the village. We believe that the sledge could be lowered down, filled with supplies, and hauled back up using the wheel and rope. There was a large cellar / store vault next door to the wheel.

When we departed the Abbey, we walked along the ramparts / walls to avoid the growing crowd on the “Grand Rue”. We loved the little village hotels and roofs overlooking the sea. We didn’t go in any shops, and we didn’t buy any food. We were very satisfied with our experience and decided we were ready to go back on the shuttle bus to our car. We were back at the car by about 11:45am.

The tide was coming in fast

Jason and R stand above

Some people ‘do’ this attraction very differently than we did. You can stay in a hotel in the village or very close by. You can visit it in the morning and come back at night when the place is lit up. It might be a spiritual experience for you involving a lot of prayer. You can spend 32 euros on an omelet at a Michelin restaurant near the entrance. You could shop and buy knight’s armour and swords and postcards and who knows what else. You could probably find fun little alleys inside the village and explore every nook and cranny for hours.

But if you are prepared and know what you want to see, and are mobile, you can do all the main and very awesome things for 32 euros total for a family of 4 in about 2.5-3 hours. Add a couple of hours during peak times for crowd control and line ups.

I have written the times out here because I read a variety of posts and recommendations on how long to spend here, but found it challenging to figure it out. I was nervous we would be short on time, so we booked an evening train out of Rennes to head toward Paris. We had our picnic lunch back by our car, drove for one hour back to Rennes, and had plenty of time to hang out in Rennes before our train.

In Rennes we checked out the old city and the cathedral and then hung out at the train station for a couple of hours.

We had an adventure trying to find and fill up our rental car with gasoline (does it take diesel? Or regular gas? Why are so many gas stations out of gas right now? There aren’t any gas stations right in the city of Rennes!)