Bay of the Somme

...the far side of the bay of the Somme.


* Why go, and how? *

Even the most enthusiastic advocates (like me) of overnight shopping/eating/drinking trips to France have to admit that the area around Calais and Boulogne does sometimes become a bit overrun with English visitors (like me).

If we want to avoid ourselves, or at least each other, we have to venture a bit further afield. Fortunately there ...
...of these places is the bay at the mouth of the river Somme.

An hour's cruise southwards down the A16 autoroute (and a few euros toll) will whisk you away from the hubbub of the Channel ports to a much more relaxed and far less anglicised environment. No complicated navigation is needed to find your way. When you reach the service area called 'Aire de la Baie de Somme' you have just missed the ideal exit, sign-posted Rue. No matter, ... more

As you walk west towards the sunset along the beach at Le Crotoy, the rattle of shingle soon gives way to the soft crunch of seashells in the sand beneath your feet. Before long you are away from the town and the only other sound to be heard is from out in the estuary, a mixed chorus of gulls, geese and sandpipers. They rise and fall in flurries amid the creeks in the grey-green mud. Dusk descends, and a red navigation light flashes out to sea. When you turn to retrace your footsteps, a trail of luminescent dots discloses the habitations on the far side of the bay of the Somme.

* Why go, and how? *

Even the most enthusiastic advocates (like me) of overnight shopping/eating/drinking trips to France have to admit that the area around Calais and Boulogne does sometimes become a bit overrun with English visitors (like me).

If we want to avoid ourselves, or at least each other, we have to venture a bit further afield. Fortunately there are places easily accessible for a short stay to anyone with a car that are not so bustling, and where the natives rather than the cross-Channel raiders still seem to be in the majority. One of the most attractive of these places is the bay at the mouth of the river Somme.

An hour's cruise southwards down the A16 autoroute (and a few euros toll) will whisk you away from the hubbub of the Channel ports to a much more relaxed and far less anglicised environment. No complicated navigation is needed to find your way. When you reach the service area called 'Aire de la Baie de Somme' you have just missed the ideal exit, sign-posted Rue. No matter, there is another exit just a little further on. Meanwhile, if you choose, you can enjoy a coffee or snack beside the duck-pond at the Aire, which is, for a motorway service area, a remarkably pleasant spot. In fact, it is probably the only motorway service area at which I shall ever recommend stopping, because generally I detest them, even in France. Don't fill up with petrol here, though; you'll find it much more cheaply at French supermarkets.

Once off the autoroute you find yourself at first in flat agricultural countryside, not unattractive but you would not go there for the scenery alone. It is only when you reach the bay itself that you understand the appeal of the place.

* The natural bay *

The Somme estuary is wide, about three miles wide at the point where it reaches the Channel, but shallow, clogged with shifting sandbanks. In the nineteenth century it was linked by canal to the industrial town of Abbeville, but the tendency of the Somme to silt up - the mud level accretes at the astonishing rate of an inch a year - left the bay mercifully free of commercial shipping. It has no real port, just two small towns, originally fishing villages, one to each side of the bay.

Mostly, the surrounding coast consists of undulating dunes, low-lying grasslands and salt marshes, partly submerged at high tide. The local word for these is "mollières" - nothing to do with the playwright, but from "mollir", meaning to yield or go soft - and very squelchy they look. There is little cultivation, though one sees sparse flocks of sheep grazing on the marshy pastures. Sea and shore merge at the margins, the division between them often indistinct. This makes for a moody landscape, dominated by the sky. On a bright day all seems smiling and serene; on a dark day sombre and even menacing. Sometimes sudden squalls blow in from the Channel. Sometimes sea-mists obscure everything.

Seabirds thrive in this environment and the air is usually shrill with their calls. Over 300 species of bird, some of them very rare, are known to visit and the area is a mecca for bird-spotters. There is also a colony of harbour seals in the bay, and occasionally they can be spotted, though they tend to sneakily submerge at exactly the moment when you have the camera out and ready.

* The towns *

The two towns that flank the bay are very different in character.

The larger and more picturesque is unquestionably St Valery on the southern bank. Built on and in the lee of that rarity around the bay, a hill, St Valery was a strongpoint in mediaeval times, and has interesting buildings dating from various periods since. In 1066, it was the final setting-off point for William the Conqueror's invasion fleet.

On the hill, the "haute-ville" still has vestiges of the original fortifications. The remains of the castle itself are inaccessible, but there are stretches of rampart to be seen and a fine fortified 15th-century gate at the top of the hill above the beach. Here the streets are quiet and charming, with houses built in varying patterns of brick and flint, some half-timbered in the Norman style, and many with shutters painted in a characteristic cobalt blue. Other lanes, "rues fleuries", consist of little but stone walls and flowering plants - day-lilies, oxeye daisies, poppies, hollyhocks and valerian.

The church of St Martin, reached as you descend towards the mediaeval gate out to the "basse-ville" alongside the estuary, sports a chequer-board motif of flint and sandstone and impressive gargoyles. Nowadays St Valery is focussed on the "basse-ville", and is first and foremost a sea-side resort. Not primarily a bathing resort, since swimming in the estuary can be dangerous, but more a character resort in the style of Rye, Whitstable or Honfleur.

There is a relaxing stroll (or a bracing walk, if you happen to be taking it in the face of a buffeting breeze from the west) to be had along the front facing the bay. This begins on open boardwalk built out from the original quay, before coming under the shade of lime and plane trees on its way to such beach as the town has to offer, below the hill.

Parallel to and behind the promenade runs the main street, called the Quai Perrée, with houses, shopfronts, cafés and restaurants crammed closely together on each side of its narrow width. In high summer this can become busy, even crowded, but it offers a more sheltered alternative to the walk along the front.

St Valery's counterpart on the north side of the bay, Le Crotoy, seems quiet, even somnolent, by comparison - still more of a village than a town, and much less of a resort, though new holiday apartments are being built behind the beach to the west, and around the little marina to the east. The main part of the town nestles on a little promontory, whereas St Valery sprawls along its southern shore. Le Crotoy too was once fortified, and Joan of Arc was captured and imprisoned there, but no trace of the original castle remains, and it conveys little sense of history.

Its main more recent claim to fame is as the home of Jules Verne, whose house can be seen. It has a shopping street, a quayside with market square and a sheltered haven for fishing and pleasure boats, but so far not much else. Only on Fridays, market day, does Le Crotoy become animated, but it has its own unassuming charm.

* Things to do *

Unless you are a nature-lover, you won't find many amusements around the Bay of the Somme. The resultant peaceful atmosphere is one reason for recommending a visit, but is also why many visitors will not want to be detained for longer than a night or two. Avid bird-watchers, on the other hand, will probably never want to leave.

There are no fun-fairs or amusement arcades here, though there are one or two gestures in the direction of attracting tourists. The main one is Somme Bay railway (Chemin de Fer de la Baie de Somme), revived by local enthusiasts who reopened a disused line in 1971. In the summer season, this offers trains drawn by steam locos chugging back and forth along a ten-mile crescent track from Le Crotoy through the inland village of Noyelles to St Valery and on to Cayeux-sur-Mer, a small shingle-beached resort just outside the bay to the south. Curiously, the railway manages to do this without impinging obtrusively on the peace of the salt-marshes. The road the joins St Valery to Le Crotoy around much the same crescent is much more disturbing to the natural calm of the area.

To enjoy that natural calm to the full, exploration is best done on foot or by bike, or by the sea kayaks that can be hired locally. Horses, I believe, can also be hired. On foot, the best walk in my view is seawards from St Valery, along the fringes of the mollières until you reach to the cluster of fisherman's houses and moorings that shelter behind the cape of Le Hourdel. This is the ideal place from which to experience the sense of being isolated between sea and sky; the point itself is also reputedly the best place to spot seals basking on the beach, though I have only ever seen them bobbing in the tide.

You see more adventurous folk out on the tongue of marshlands in the middle of the bay itself. If they are locals, they are probably gathering shellfish or samphire, a salty herb which is not quite a seaweed. It is possible, at low tide, to take a guided walk across from St Valery to Le Crotoy, but it is tricky going and certainly not something to attempt without local expertise.

For the birds, or at least for the bird-watchers, the big attraction is the Parc Ornithologique du Marquenterre, a famous and extensive reserve on the northern fringes of the estuary beyond Le Crotoy. Entry for adults is €9.90, about £7, but it is a natural haven covering several square kilometres, with way-marked paths, hides and plenty of educational aids for ornithological amateurs, so one feels one is supporting a good cause. On the other side of the bay there is the Bird House (Maison de l'Oiseau) museum just outside Cayeux.

Slightly further afield, if you were staying several days and looking for outings, are the battlefield of Crecy, the Abbey and excellent gardens at Valloires, the chateau at Rambures and golf and a water-park at Belle-Dune, near Fort Mahon Plage. The town of Abbeville has a more attractive centre that its drab outskirts lead on to expect, and two charming gardens (Emonville and Bagatelle). But none of these is strictly speaking in the bay of the Somme.

* Where to stay *

As always in France, there are numerous hotels, chambres d'hôtes (B&B equivalents), flats to rent and campsites in the area. In St Valery, I have stayed at: ~

~ Le Relais Guillaume de Normandy, a tall, turreted edifice in Normandy-Gothic style, which on a stormy night would serve admirably as a set for a horror movie. Inside, though, the rooms are quite conventional, and some have a splendid outlook across the bay. The food is good and reasonably priced. Rooms are 62-80€ (c£50-65). A word of caution, though: the management seem very reluctant to take bookings for one-night-only stays, unless they are running out of time late in the afternoon to fill that night's vacancies, which might be a bit of a gamble at busy times.

~ The Picardia, almost next door, but back from the front. Comfortable, but without quite the same character, and without a restaurant, though it does do an excellent breakfast. My wife and I stayed in a triple duplex room with one of our sons (extra bed upstairs) for 85€ (c£68); ordinary doubles start at 68€ (c£55), breakfast included.

I have also heard well of, but not personally stayed at, La Gribane, where the chambres d'hôte accommodation includes converted stables in the gardens of a villa facing the bay at the quiet end of town.

In Le Crotoy, I have stayed at: ~

~ The Hotel de la Baie, better known locally as Chez Mado after the redoubtable patronne who used to be in charge there. This is more a restaurant with rooms (there are only three - best to book well in advance) than a hotel, but the rooms are comfortable if you can get in, not expensive (68€; c£55). The restaurant is good, and excellent value.

~ The Hotel des Tourelles, originally the seaside home of the parfumier Guerlain, recently renovated and striking in appearance its pointy turrets painted a deep rust-red. Here we paid 80€ (c£65) for a functionally furnished double with bay-view. The food in the restaurant was reasonably good, but somewhat spoiled by slow and unfriendly service, and in our view poorer value than at Chez Mado.

If are able to stay in Le Crotoy on a Thursday night, this is a good plan, so as to be in position to wander round the weekly market on the quayside the next morning.

Just a few miles inland from the bay in the sleepy country town of Rue, I have also stayed at the Hotel le Lion d'Or, a typically French logis with a good restaurant. I have been unable to track down the current room tariff in the guides or on the net, but it was in much the same range as those above. Obviously you do not here have the seaside environment to enjoy, but it makes a good alternative centre for exploring the wider area.

* Local cuisine *

Naturally, given its location, seafood features strongly among local specialities. A Plateau de Fruits de Mer would be a reliable choice in any restaurant. The grey shrimps known as sauterelles are tasty, while excellent mussels, cockles, plaice, mullet and eels are also caught or gathered in the bay.

Also well worth a mention - and an order if you see it on a menu between July and January when it should be fresh - is the distinctively full-flavoured salt-marsh lamb. Otherwise, the cuisine is much as you would find elsewhere in Picardy or the Pas-de-Calais. Dishes, such as flamiche, based on the tangy, sharp Maroilles cheese are also worth looking out for.

* When to go *

Spring or autumn for preference, as with most other places. The bay can also be impressively austere in winter. The time to avoid, in my opinion, is high summer, when St Valery in particular is at its busiest and the bay is most likely to be crowded with leisure craft.

* Recommendation *

In researching the background for this review, I found that the Bay of the Somme has recently been officially recognised among thirty-two "Grands Sites de France", signifying its unusual ecology and importance as a bird sanctuary. More dubiously, it is also listed on a website (www.world-bays.com) as one of the twenty-eight "most beautiful bays of the world". Since no fewer than five of these turn out to be in France, one somehow suspects that the provenance of the website might be self-servingly French, and prone to exaggeration.

Personally, I'm not sure that I would list it among the most beautiful bays that I've ever seen in my limited experience. But it is attractive, interesting and can be hauntingly atmospheric.

The main criticism - and it is really a regret rather than a criticism - would be that its unspoiled nature covers too small an area, and that development is closing in on it. By the same token though, at no great distance from the Channel ports, it's readily accessible. It has comfortable and characterful places to stay, appetising places to eat and two old towns well worth an amble. On that basis, I would definitely recommend a visit.

© torr 2007 (updated, and prices adjusted to reflect the downturn of the pound against the euro, alas, June 2008)

A review of the Pas-de-Calais region, together with comment on short cross-channel trips generally, can be found at:
http://www.ciao.co.uk/Pas_de_Calais__Review_5411176 

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