Each year in early August, the city of Lorient on the coast to the South of us, holds a Festival to celebrate Celtic culture. This year the Celts of Australia were the "Guests of Honour".
It is a well attended event. I wouldn't be surprised if there were half a million visitors in Lorient.
We purchased seats in the stadium where the parade, which goes through the streets of Lorient, comes to for "The Finale".
At the head of the procession is the Brittany flag followed by the Australian and New Zealand flags.
These are the flags of the other participating regions. From left to right CORNWALL, ISLE OF MAN, SCOTLAND, IRELAND, WALES, ?, USA, ?, ?, CANADA, ? I will have to check on the others but one is the Basque flag and one is Nova Scotia, Canada, I think.
Breton "Line Dancing"
Indian elephant. Not sure of the significance of this!
Breton music played on instruments of limited range is interesting to begin with but then gets a bit monotonous. Great to doze with in the sunshine though! The other side of the stadium might have been a better location for photos, of which there are not too many as the camera battery died.
We enjoyed a walk around the harbour which was crowded and had many exhibits but the highlight of the day was trying to find where we had parked the car!!
We have been to Lorient a few times. It's not a complicated place so we just went with the flow and were not particularly careful remembering the route. It took us 15 minutes to get to the stadium and more than two hours to find the car afterwards. It was Sunday so not easy to find anything open. After much walking I found a café which fortunately had tourist give away maps of the city. Cathy and I were barely talking by this stage so she sat on a bench while I made my way to the car!!
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