The Trees of Saint Malo

The sycamore by the front gate is the largest tree inside the walls.

I made the joke to Rick that my next blog post was going to be entitled "There are more biscuit shops in St. Malo than there are trees." It's a bit of an exaggeration, but only a bit. There are very many shops where you can buy the traditional Breton cookies here and very few trees inside the walls of St. Malo. Coming from Moulins, where there is hardly anything BUT trees, it makes a change to find so few around us here.

I made it a project to actually count all the trees of intra muros St. Malo. I counted exactly 100, although on a walk the other day I discovered eight more I had overlooked. Trees do not line the streets, probably because they are so narrow, mostly only one lane wide and perhaps, since the town is built upon rocky ground, large trees are not able to thrive.

I marvel at how the walls grow out of the stone they are built upon.

As I have described, St. Malo intra muros is a very small and compact space. Only a limited amount of room is given up to parks or open gathering spaces. On top of the walls is one such expanse, the largest open space of all, but there is not one tree to be found there.

Bastion de la Hollande, built during the war with Holland in the 17th century. 

In this case, the reason is that this plot is built on the top of what used to be a massive dog kennel. The symbol of St. Malo is a dog. There is, of course, a story behind this.

 

Perhaps as early as the 13th century and carrying on almost to the end of the 18th, St. Malo had a curfew. All the gates of the city were closed and locked at 10pm. 20 hungry and grumpy English mastiffs, who had not been fed during the day, were then let out of the kennel to wander the streets. Presumably they were meant to discourage any kind of invaders, but also, apparently, to keep the townsfolk from being rowdy. In the morning a bell would call the hounds back to the kennel with the promise of some food.

Marché aux Legumes.

You might call The Marché aux Legumes (The Vegetable Market) the Center of town. There is no longer a market here, though there is a covered market just a block away. The little square is a gathering place and does offer benches for sitting. Here you find a little group of trees...little being the operative word. They are actually just bay laurels, which in our garden grow as hedges. These are pruned to be tree-like. To me they seem a little reluctant to fulfill this destiny.

Near the cathedral of Saint Vincent.

Near the cathedral is the closest thing to a park we have in St. Malo intra muros. It is a monument to the fallen soldiers and is called Enclos de la Résistance. More than 2500 resistance fighters lived in St. Malo and nearby Dinard and Dinan; many died for their country. The little square is one of my favorite parts of town and it features several trees. One evening when we took a walk there we were also entertained by a murmuration of birds. We see lots of seagulls, and have even made friends with one in particular, but rarely do we see smaller birds, so this was a great treat.

A acrobatic show of starlings.

Our broken-winged gull friend who comes visit us when we sit at the commercial port.

Not too far from our apartment is a discreet little corner that hosts a few plane trees with flowers planted below. It softens the surrounding granite buildings. Gardening does not seem to be a major pastime in St. Malo!

Pretty corner, but not open to the public.