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"touristy" Brittany - do not want! | ||
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 Language Learning Forum : Cultural Experiences in Foreign Languages |  | |
| Jinx Triglot Senior Member Germany reverbnation.co Joined 5693 days ago 1085 posts - 1879 votes  Speaks: English*, German, French Studies: Catalan, Dutch, Esperanto, Croatian, Serbian, Norwegian, Mandarin, Italian, Spanish, Yiddish | Message 1 of 3 12 July 2011 at 10:04pm | IP Logged |
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Hi everybody. First, let me say that I know this post isn't explicitly related to languages, but I really hope it can slip under the radar. Look at it this way: some American tourists who can actually speak a little French want to have experiences in France that monolingual Americans wouldn't necessarily be able to have.
I'm currently on a three-week vacation with my family in Brittany, France. We just arrived on Saturday, and are staying for two weeks in Landrévarzec, a small village about 20 minutes north of Quimper. For the third week, we will be living right in the town of Dinan, south of St.-Malo. Now, to the question at hand: so far, we've been to Quimper and to the small town of Locronan, which received an award for being one of the most beautiful cities in the region. They were both, indeed, quite lovely, but the experience was almost ruined for us by the extremity and intensity of the tourist atmosphere. I understand that Brittany is generally quite a touristy region, but we would love to find some more genuine-feeling places to spend time in, places where people are just living their lives, rather than showing off preserved architecture like it's a magic trick and over-charging for ice-creams and horse-drawn carriage rides. Does anyone have any recommendations and tips for me and my family? We can all get by in French (and the people here are amazingly nice, hardly ever switching into English), and we like the authentic old Breton culture. (I know, I know, just like every other tourist...) We particularly love: - Breton choral music - old-book shops - local dishes, e.g. sea food & crêpes - buying fresh food at markets to cook for ourselves - beautiful old buildings - window-shopping and just strolling around (flâner?) We tend to avoid: - fancy restaurants (we're poor!) - guided tours - buying lots of souvenirs (again, the being-poor thing) - some cathedrals (they all start to look the same after a while...) By the way, we have a rental car, but we prefer not to drive for hours and hours (we already drove 14 hours non-stop from Paris to Quimper, an epic and foolish adventure). I guess that's about it. Maybe I've given you all too much information, but I'm really hoping to figure out a more authentic-feeling way to experience this beautiful area of France. Any tips (in English or French) will be very gratefully accepted. Thank you very much in advance! Edited by Jinx on 12 July 2011 at 10:10pm 1 person has voted this message useful | |
| tibbles Diglot Senior Member United States Joined 5191 days ago 245 posts - 422 votes Speaks: English*, Spanish Studies: Korean | Message 2 of 3 13 July 2011 at 3:28am | IP Logged |
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Maybe post your question at tripadvisor as well? A lot of people there are very adept at avoiding the tourist trap places and finding authentic experiences.
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| troglodyte Diglot Groupie BrazilRegistered users can see my Skype Name Joined 5280 days ago 53 posts - 69 votes Speaks: Portuguese*, EnglishC2 Studies: Italian | Message 3 of 3 13 July 2011 at 9:41pm | IP Logged |
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Salut Jinx.
Vous pouvez visiter ce forum francophone : http://voyageforum.com/ Lá vous pouvez rechercher des discussions sûr la Bretagne, où quand même commencer une nouvelle avec vos questions. Bonnes vacances. Edited by troglodyte on 13 July 2011 at 9:48pm 2 persons have voted this message useful |
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