Beauport Abbey

Well, this was a lovely surprise. Today M&D took me to a ruined abbey, some 10 miles away from here in a town called Beauport, near Paimpol (thats France folks). For those not up on such things, an abbey is a monastic community governed by an Abbot or Abbotess. Basically a monastery - I'm not sure what the difference is, maybe someone could explain?! Mum has tried hard, bless her, but I'm still in the dark...

Either way, this one was 13th Century and made the most spectacular and atmospheric setting. One couldn't fail to get good pictures, so I will bore you below with my shots. Aside from the historical significance, it was a place loaded with emotion, and without wanting to over dramatise, a palpable sense of decay, timelessness, death and nature - if that makes sense. Sprouting from the ruins were natures attempts at reclamation - this once magnificent building, all angles and lines, juxtaposed against these huge twisting trees. The bleak, white sky and bitter wind, added to the sense of the cold, souless erosion of humanity by entropy and what must have seemed at the time to be an eternal spiritual strength. Here, Christian artifice, once loaded with that power station sub-hum that you feel in churches, now broken by natures hard reality. Real life, real eternity reasserted by the Earth, making human attempts to capture, house and live the eternally divine in masonry look rather pathetic. Here was the true divinity of the universe, truly majestic - and still very much alive. It was a place rich with atmosphere, all enhanced by the constant howl of the wind through the abandoned fireplace and flues. I found it quite moving.

In the middle of all of this green chaos were two graves, side by side, of an abbey benefactor - a Duke and his wife. I hope this doesn't sound pretentious, but it certainly made me stop and think about life and death and our own transitory lives - our present, already someone elses history.

Enjoy the photos.