Visiting Mont Saint-Michele
On this rainy morning, Stanley herded 14 American students and 13 French students from the Ecole Speciale d’Architecture for a 2 day trip to Mont Saint Michele. The first day involved visiting the monastery there and the village surrounding it.
Mont Saint Michel is a monastery built at the top of a rocky islet that overlooks the sea, right at the border between Brittany and Normandy. The statue of Archangel Saint Michael towers 560 feet above the English Channel. Mont Saint Michel was an island until a causeway was built at the end of the 19th century. It was separated from the mainland by one mile of sand at low tide, or by water at high tide. The range in tides is one of the greatest in Europe: it can be 46 feet between high and low water marks. The bay around the Mont is absolutely flat and the rising tide is said to sometimes match the speed of a galloping horse. In the early 8th century, according to catholic lore, Archangel Saint Michael instructed the bishop of Avranches, Saint Aubert, to build the monastery. From the year 1000 on, and for 6 consecutive centuries thereafter, the Dukes of Normandy and the pilgrims financed the construction of additional structures despite the difficulty of building on an island only accessible by foot. During the French Revolution, the fortified abbey became a prison for political opponents. Mont Saint Michel was designated an official French National Heritage Site in 1872 and is restored on a yearly basis by the French Government.
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