La Hague, a young town under the winds
For three years, the new municipality of La Hague has grouped together nineteen, now showing itself to be the most extensive of the Channel, the wildest, the windiest too.
Éole spumone 130 days on average per year.
The suroît rushed from the sea tossed the clouds from late autumn to early spring, chasing the rain towards Cherbourg.
The north-easterly high pressure breeze then takes over, softer, more caressing, warmer.
Who hates that the wind slams his face, blushes his cheeks, messes his hair, goes his way.
But who appreciates these iodized armfuls of them gorges themselves to lose breath by traversing the paths skirting the sea and the fields, crossing the dunes and the pastures.
Read also: La Manche, our travel guide: why you have to (re) discover this corner of Normandy
Goury, at the heart of this end of the world
To reach, on foot, from
Auderville
, upstream the
port of Goury
, epicenter of La Hague, the road slopes gently, brushing against the grassy patchwork delimited by dry stone walls.
At the last bend we discover the lighthouse rising 48 m above the waves.
He points out the Raz Blanchard, the strongest tidal current in the world where the breaking waves carved by the shallows crisscross violently, embroidering a jumble of lace.
Soil for writers
The bay of Écalgrain.
Aymeric Picot
This is where Claudie Gallay planted the characters of her novel Les Déferlantes.
“
I spotted this moorland on the map.
It was an overwhelming romantic encounter.
I spent a day there and then returned to a guest room in Auderville, writing while walking along the cliffs, transcribing my notes in the evening in front of the window overlooking the Goury lighthouse.
"
Didier Decoin, President of the Goncourt academy fell in love at first sight and for over fifty years, wrote in his fishing house in the
hamlet of La Roche,
near the lighthouse.
We cross this locality with a few houses curled up by taking, on the left, the customs path, one of the most beautiful in France, which climbs the cliff to then fall steeply into the
bay of Ecalgrain with its golden
Venetian sand, before climbing again to the
Nez de Jobourg
.
Walking along, we sometimes catch a glimpse of a few wild, hairy and shy goats, called Jobourg's, grazing in unstable equilibrium on the crumbly rock.
While every second we are astonished by the changing shades of the sky and the sea, understanding that François Truffaut for
Les deux Anglaises et le continent
and Roman Polanski for
Tess
have placed their camera here.
Hi artists
Jacques Prévert's house in Omonville-la-Petite.
Adobe Stock
To the right of the lighthouse, the customs officers' path imposes its course through the fixed dunes embellished with lichen and in the spring of a multicolored flora.
Many sea and land birds nest in the secrecy of this dune vegetation, flushed out in silence by the binoculars of ornithologists.
In sometimes wet ground, we progress to the tiny
Port Racine
, where the moorings of a handful of boats crisscross.
Then moving away slightly from the coast we enter
Omonville-la-Petite
marked with the seal of Jacques Prévert who after having spent the last years of his life there rests in the cemetery.
Modest, the poet chose for stele a cow scraper, granite stone where mammals get rid of insects.
It remains to win
Gréville
, a small village with well-aligned houses where the painter Jean-François Millet was born before reaching
Landemer
on the coast, trying in vain to find the modest house where Boris Vian, a child, spent his holidays as he wrote in 1953 in his Diary:
“Landemer was called.
Seventeen inhabitants.
We had small barracks, an owl, wonderful country.
"
A wonderful country, actually.
You have to be a bit of a poet, a bit of a sailor, a bit of Earth, a bit in love, to understand its unvarnished beauty, its charming hotels with few stars and its generous tables.
A wonderful country that in one sentence Prévert summed up so well
“Colors to upset painters, small, narrow roads that lead nowhere and everywhere to the sea which slams the rocks.
"
Practical guide to the peninsula
TO SLEEP
The Erguillère hotel, overlooking Port Racine has 9 rooms, 7 of which have a sea view. Anne-Marie Cattelain-Le Dû
The Landemer
, Laurent Blaise, owner of this 9-room hotel opening onto the sea, is a real kind.
He welcomes his guests by listing the VIPs who stayed here, from Claude Monet to Françoise Sagan, from the couple Piaf Cerdan to the Infanta of Spain.
Rooms from € 107 to € 195.
Hotel Restaurant Le Landemer, 2, rue des Douanes 50460 Urville-Nacqueville.
Phone.
: 02 33 04 05 10.
Hotel l'Erguillère,
overlooking Port Racine.
9 rooms, 7 of which have a sea view and, on returning from a stroll, tea-time with homemade pastries.
Rooms from 110 € to 160 €.
Hotel L'Erguillère, Port Racine, 50440 Saint Germain des Vaux.
Phone.
: 02 33 52 75 31.
The Fort of Vauville
.
This last link in the chain of defense of Cotentin in the 18th century, signed Vauban, is classified in the supplementary inventory of Historical Monuments.
Just a room for two with living room heated by a wood fire, kitchen and dining room.
Rare!
85 € per night.
Fort de Vauville, Vauville, 50440, La Hague.
Phone.
: 06 47 91 92 75.
GOOD TABLES
The Landemer
, 10 tables under a glass roof with a view of La Manche and a young Dutch chef, 30 years old, Hendrik Jansen Van der Silgte, who cooks to perfection local and seafood products. Two menus, Pavilion € 45, Tasting 68 €.
Hotel Restaurant Le Landemer, 2, rue des Douanes 50460 Urville-Nacqueville.
Phone.
: 02 33 04 05 10.
Le Moulin à Vent
, directly above Port Racine with a lovely rock garden.
The chef, Antoine Fernandes, favors local and organic products such as Jobourg lamb.
First menu € 39.
Le Moulin à Vent, 10, route de Port Racine, Saint-Germain-des-Vaux 50440, La Hague.
Phone.
02 33 52 75 20.
0'Little crab from Goury,
bistronomic, locavore cuisine, highlighting shellfish and fish.
With the port of Goury and its lighthouse opposite.
Menu from € 16.50 and children's menu at € 9.50.
In case at any time.
Ô P'tit Crabe de Goury, 1, rue du Port, Goury, 50440 La Hague.
Phone.
: 02 33 52 77 01.
CULTIVATE
The birthplace of Jean-François Millet in Gréville-La Hague.
Aymeric Picot
Even if this is not the primary goal, some places deserve to be spent between two walks.
La Maison de Prévert, in Omonville-la-Petite,
designed by his decorator friend Alexandre Trauner.
Go to the nearby cemetery where the writer rests with his wife, his daughter and his friend Trauner and also the poetic garden created by his wife and his friends Arletty, Yves Montand, Serge Reggiani, Juliette Greco, among others.
Avoid the ugly statue ordered by the municipality representing the two friends.
It sparked the ire of the poet's granddaughter who suddenly recovered some of the furniture in the house.
Pity !
Maison Jacques Prévert, 3 Hameau du Val, Omonville-la-Petite, 50440 La Hague.
Phone.
: 02 33 52 72 38.
Birthplace of Jean-François Millet
.
Labeled "Maison des Illustres" by the Ministry of Culture, this village residence traces the life of the painter of the Angelus, and the inhabitants of La Hague at the beginning of the 19th century.
Quality temporary exhibitions.
House of Jean-François Millet, 19, Hameau de Gruchy, 50440 Gréville-La Hague.
Phone.
: 02 33 01 81 91.
The Manoir du Tourp.
16th century fortified farm, coupled with a stately home.
Numerous exhibitions and show tours that children enjoy.
Manoir du Tourp, Omonville-la-Rogue, 50440 La Hague.
Phone.
: 02 33 01 85 89.
SPEND
Gliding
To see the earth from the sky, microlight, paraglider, hang-glider.
Open every weekend.
Vauville Hague Gliding Center, Maneyrol camp, 50440 Vauville.
Phone.
: 02 33 52 77 72.
Horse
Hiking:
La Hague loop, 40 kilometers on steep paths bordering the peninsula on the sea side and on the countryside.
More info on manchetourisme.com
Riding, aerobatics, dressage:
children and adults.
Sainte-Croix-Hague Equestrian Center, 6, route des Pallières, 50440 Sainte Croix, La Hague.
Phone.
: 02 33 04 74 58.
More information:
La Hague Tourist Office, Cap Cotentin, 1, Place de la Madeleine, 50440, Beaumont Hague.
Phone.
: 02 33 52 74 94.
GO
By car,
3 hours 50 minutes from Paris to Cherbourg or La Hague via the A 13.
By plane,
Cherbourg Maupertuis-sur-mer airport, 20 km from La Hague.
By Ferry,
Irish Ferries and Brittany Ferries serve the Cherbourg cross-Channel ferry terminal.
By train,
Paris-Saint Lazare-Cherbourg, many trains, average 3 h 20. Station 20 minutes from La Hague.
By bus
, the agglomeration of Cotentin manages the lines of the Nomad network which serve towns, countryside and coast.
