MTB track n°2 - Plougonvelin

Bertheaume beach parking lot.

In summer, the Bertheaume fort parking lot will be the preferred location, making parking easier.

The 37-meter-high Bertheaume fort was built around 1690, at the request of Louis XIV, to protect Brest during the War of the League of Augsburg. Vauban installed three cannons and two mortars on the upper platform of the islet to control the Bertheaume cove, where all ships entering or leaving Brest harbor still pass today. A wise decision: in June 1694, an English fleet attacked, but was greeted by a deluge of bombs from the fort, enough to repel them.

Bertheaume's usefulness was no longer in doubt, and Vauban's successors continued his work in the 18th and 19th centuries. Barracks, powder magazines and a perimeter wall were first installed, before the fort, then only accessible at low tide, was equipped with a footbridge in 1835, followed by casemates some fifty years later.

This little garden, which is well worth a visit, is the voluntary work of a private individual. However, Gaby Quellec opens it to the public and is delighted to see visitors admiring and respecting his plantations. Among the flowers or in the shelter of the foliage, visitors can sometimes discover a small building: a reduced lighthouse, an old bistro or a small manor house. The owner, who has become both a mason and a model-maker, thus introduces a reminder of human presence into his garden.

Discover this marvellous "Monument Historique" site: the ruins of an ancient Benedictine abbey, a small chapel, the Saint-Mathieu lighthouse and museum, and the cenotaph.