more canal stuff

Spent a day in central Brittany walking a very sad stretch of canal between Pontivy and Lac de Guerlédan. Because the barrage at the lake cut the canal in two in 1930, commercial traffic stopped and this section has never been restored or maintained as a canal, although the nasty tarmac tow-path must get its share of walkers and cyclists. The locks are all in dismal state and many of the lock-houses have been abandoned. The landscape is uninteresting and there are few buildings of note along the way - one chapel with excellent painted ceilings, a square-towered manoir and a mill midstream on the Blavet. The barrage is grim, like a concentration camp - and not improved by the driving rain that plagued me much of the day.