Buttery Peninsulas - Saint-Malo, France

I came to Saint-Malo and did everything backwards from my visit last year. It was raining this time and the fortressed town, founded in the 1st century B.C. and now a mixture of pirate legacy, salted butter, and savory buckwheat galettes, was under a continuous mist. I borrowed a long umbrella from my hotel and climbed the stairs of the sturdy stone wall surrounding the peninsula, cradling a steaming cappuccino in my other hand for warmth.

There was barely a shoreline in sight, and the tide surrounding the abandoned Fort National had risen to surround it by several feet. Last year, I had been able to stroll the beach almost to its entrance just before the jagged rocks. But, today, I watched small children below dip their sneakers towards the violent tide and run back squealing in a sliver of sand.

I continued in the opposite direction of my first visit, tracing the circumference of the peninsula from the dramatic view of two tiny tidal island dots in the distance, Petit Bé and Grand Bé, towards the statue of Robert Sarcouf, a French pirate pointing accusatorially at the English.

I bit into a Ker Y Pomme filled with pear and chocolate, instead of the region’s buttery specialty, the kouign amann, that lured me there last year, and then had an unexpected Chaud Gaulois at L’Ange Bleu — a reviving cup of hot cider mixed with rum, cinnamon, orange, and clove, after having walked in the freezing gust for an hour.

The rain finally stopped in the late afternoon, and I climbed the stone staircase again. Under the sun-filled sky, I spotted my favorite fixture in Saint-Malo, the one that never changes. I stood shoulder to wing with the seabirds that perch on the fortress walls and barely move while they gaze in the distance — as if protecting their buttery peninsula from English invaders and longing for pirates from centuries ago.

Kouign Amann Saint-Malo
6 Rue Porcon de la Barbinais
For Ker Y Pomme and Kouign Amann

Le Comptoir Breizh Cafe
6 Rue de l’Orme
For savory buckwheat/sarrasin galettes and salted caramel crêpes