Presqu´ile de Quiberon:

La cote sauvage for the wave hunters, Baie de Quiberon for sailors, Carnac for stone age enthusiasts, Quiberon for the mondane Crépe lovers, this peninsula offers more than enough highlights in a pretty small area. Be ready to move around a little bit and You´ll never get bored here.

For about 20km the peninsula reaches out into the ocean. But it nevers gets wider than 2km, at it´s narrowest point it only has about 100m of width. This fragile looking piece of land faces on it´s northwestern side the full furour of the mighty Atlantic. Cote Sauvage this coast is aptly named. It takes bravely the beating of swells and creates a very protected bay on its opposite, the southeastern coast. In contrary to the open ocean setup of the cote sauvage, the Baie De Quiberon is a shallow calm water that with the change of tides even falls dry at a big proportion.

The versatility and beauty of this area not only nowadays attracts a huge number of tourists (who come mostly in summer and cause defty traffic jams). About 6000 years ago, some stone age folks seemed to like this area a lot and set up more than 3000 menhirs in this area. These standing rocks remind a unsolved miracle up to now. They very much resemble of surf boards, but I wouldn´t want to add another theory to the allready existing countless ideas about what those people ment in putting such an effort into plastering the area with standing stones. Anyhow, these mytic places definitely have a strong magic. Go there at dawn on an autumn day and just walk around as the sky is dramatically lit, windblewn clowds race along and the fog kicks in. You might spot Merlin in the mist. The most spectacular sites are Carnac and Erdeven, but also the more hidden menhirs and dolmens (Crucuno has a very nice one!) throughout the erea have their magic, especially as they are less frequented.

Besides these ancient and sometimes spooky stone age sites, there´s some very nice towns around. Quiberon is the most visited one but Carnac, Erdeven, Plouharnel and Saint Pierre are worth a stop too. Here You also find herbergement / accomodation and possibilites to rent holiday houses. If You don´t like to rent one of those nice breton houses go to campsites. Do not stay at beach parkings. Too many of them are allready blocked with bars that just let pass cars under 1,80m high. Restaurants, bars, supermarkets, surf- / windsurf- / kiteboarding shops, scools for all kind of watersports and many other shops are spread throughout these towns too.

The rocky cote sauvage becomes a large beach at the isthmus of Penthievré that streches for about 15km in a large bow up north until Kerhilio. This area is the perfect windsurfing / surfing / kiteboarding arena as it has a swell fetch from southwest to north. Due to the arc, You find favourable windconditions - sideshore or offshore, depending if You ride with or without the wind - with directions south to southwest and nothwest to northeast. West comes side to sideonshore, east allways come more or less offshore. The typicall setup is a passing depression starting with winds from the south or southwest, turning west, than northwest and, if You´re lucky, taking a turn to east. This means a couple of days perfect windsurfing / kiteboarding, followed by some classic surf conditions. The cote sauvage gets the biggest waves in this area but is surfers only area as the bays and coves are bordered by rocky cliffs.

Spots for wave searching people are Port Bara, Port Blanc, Penthievré, Grand Plage, Sainte Barbe and Kerhilio.

The Baie De Quiberon offers flatwater windsurfing / kiteboarding / sailing.

From Quiberon You can take a ferry to Belle-Ile, which is a very beautifull island and hides some rarely ridden breaks.

Get more impressions of the area in the gallery and some more basic information in the info board.