...like a geopoliitical erratic...

Like the erratic boulders dotting it’s landscape, left over by the forces of receding glaciers- St Pierre is a geopolitical erratic, leftover by long ago geopolitical forces.  It looks and is out of place right now.  but it is also impossible to move.....

 We started the day with a walking tour of St Pierre, it’s history and it’s architecture.  As many Nordic towns of this era, a lot of the architecture is defined by the twin forces of fire and ice:
 A fire destroyed a lot of the town in the early 1800’s, forcing new regulations:  among those, wider streets, and buildings made out of bricks instead of wood. 

But some of the old structures which had not burned down remain and are still inhabited today.

The “ice” part is seen in the “tambour” that front many of the older houses:  They were originally removable mud rooms - in the winter the were put in place to protect the front room from cold and mud, but had to be removed in the summer to allow carriages to go through the street.

Now, they can stay all year, but have to have windows on all sides, so that pedestrians can see what’s happening on the other side (since they block the side walks).  It make the street a bit hard to navigate, but charming.  A new law says that when an old house is destroyed, it is no longer legal to replace the “tambour”.  People go around that by keeping the “tambour” in place while removing the house.  I think that’s pretty clever!

 This gave Joe the opportunity to take a lot of pictures of doors and windows, one of his favorite subjects.....

This Madonna was set at the corner of the house where the great fire that destroyed 150 houses stopped:  The owner believed that it protected the house and thus put it in a special case since then.  There are other such protective relics all over the town

St Pierre has been French since 1816.  For the century before then, it went from France to England and vice versa 9 times.  On 2 of these occasions, the English burned down the town and forced all the French inhabitants to move back to France or Canada.  But they were quite stubborn and came back.  It is unclear to me why it was worth all this fighting.  It is really cool to visit right now, with grand views, the quaint town, and the sheer oddity of it, but in the 1800?  I’m still not quite sure...
Cod is definitely part of the story.  Cod built St Pierre and Miquelon and until they basically fished out all of it, it was an endless bounty.  They, the bottom fell out.  By the 1920’s, the fishing was getting bad, but then another windfall happened:  the American prohibition - Canada was not allowed to sell booze to the US - they they could sell to “France”(In St Pierre), from where it could be smuggled to the US.  Large fortunes were made!  It was a sad day here when prohibition ended......
During WWII, the territory ended up aligned with the Vichy government, and thus de facto with Germany.  The US was worried about Germany taking over and setting up a base so close to its shores and was considering  taking it over.  De Gaulle REALLY did not want that (he did not like Vichy nor the Germans, but did not trust the US either), so he sent a few boats under the flag of "France Libre" to liberate the island.  It thus became the first part of France to be liberated from Germany.  De Gaulle came to St Pierre in 1967to thank the island and the main square is named after him.  The town also has several "croix de Lorraine" monuments (de Gaulle's symbol).

 The cod industry struggled on until it was basically closed down in 1992.  The island now lives - quite well- off French subsidies and tourism.  Tourism is just emerging and while they are eager, nice and helpful - they are just not very good at this tourism thing.... for instance - there are simply not enough places to eat:  I’m glad we came in June, because during the full season, I honestly don’t know where people are going to eat....  As far as I can tell, there are 2 small restaurants.  There are supposed to be a handful of other pizza places, or burger joints, but they are not opened....  there are no cafes to sit at, very few bars...  A food truck on the main place, by the docks, would make a fortune....  Or what about a coffee shop - anywhere?  or a place that sells T-shirts?  Isn't it amazing that you can't buy a T-shirt that says "St Pierre and Miquelon" on it?  On the one hand, it is nice to have a place so untouched and unchanged by tourism, on the other, it seems like a missed opportunity (maybe the issue is that 65% of people on the island work for the French government, so there is no real entrepreneurial drive....)   Also, they have not quite figured out this new thing called “credit cards”....  but that’s part of the adventure and we had a great day!

I loved seeing the “club de pétanque “ - it’s SOOOOOOO French.  And the mixture of Basque, Brittany and Normandy background reflected in the flag, the food, and the culture.

There is even this most French of artifacts in the museum- a guillotine!  It only served once:  some local bad guy killed another person during a robbery (around 1860) and was condemned to death..  they did not have a guillotine and had one import one from Martinique.  The public beheading was very traumatic, in part because the blade was not sharp enough.  The population was traumatized and the governor decided to never again use the guillotine - a long time before it became illegal on the main land!


The museum (where the guillotine resides) also has this impressive painting of how the town looked in the mid 1800's:

  It is huge,covering an entire wall and shows details of the daily life nicely, including the drying of cod on the "graves" (rock beds- probably same root as gravel).

After all this cultural stuff, we went searching for food for a bit - and failed- we ended up eating at the same “crêperie” as yesterday - which was fine (see above regarding the lack of restaurants).

 After which, we took a cab tour of the rest of the island, seeing the small villages that surround St Pierre,

 and got a look at the rugged and beautiful coast.

Stopped by the cemetery, where some of the older tombs have portholes (recovered from the many wrecks around the island).l

 Then we took a short ferry ride to the “île aux marins” - only 10 minutes away.  It once was home to about 700 fisherman and their families, and was completely self sustaining:  they had gardens, cattle, chickens, etc....

The last permanent inhabitants left in 1963 though and now the old houses serve as summer cottages for people from St Pierre (which I found out by barging into one, mistakenly thinking it was all a living museum....  the woman there was very nice about it....).

In the late 1800's, canons were installed because they were still worried about the darn Brits!
But they were never used in a fight - only in celebration of the 14th of July!

 The little church, no longer in use, is lovely...

 And so is the old cemetery.

 And the unbelievably clear water!

We took a walk around the entire island - I had to climb the rock on top of it! (I'm the black dot on the left side of the base of the rock- can you see me?)  The view was worth it.

We managed to find a new restaurant for dinner, where local lobster was served!  as well as 1 liter pitcher of very decent white wine for $15  (Vive la France!).  that may explain why this post has more typos than usual......









Along the way, we met a few people who were born, grew up and stayed here.  Most have gone to main land France for a few years to either study or work, and then came back.  One can wonder why they do.  This rock is barren and has very tough weather.  But it is also a cool community.  People are close to each other.  The French government pours a lot of money in it and life is easy.  It is also remote enough that they don't feel the stress of the general geopolitical forces in place right now.  And it is beautiful!  I understand why they stay.