La Ferme Marine de Cancale

Our day began with a quick drive to Cancale and Le Ferme Marine, a family run oyster farm. Cancale is a world famous oyster producing region, considered Brittany's epicenter of oyster farming and harvesting. The family that runs Le Ferme Marine has the farm in Cancale and one in Ireland as well. The environment is highly controlled, for health and tastes reasons. The high quality of the water in this area of France in particular helps with the taste of the oysters. There are 50 farms and 300 hectares of oyster farms in the bay in Cancale. 100,000 tons of oysters are produced worldwide every year and 30% of those come from Cancale. The oyster shells are popular for animal feed, especially chicken (makes their shells strong); the shells are also used for soaps, creams, cosmetics and sunglasses frames. Our guide walked us through the process at Le Ferme Marine, from beginning to end.

After the oysters are harvested, they are washed with sea water; this process stresses out the oysters, so they let them rest in a swimming pool for two weeks (above) before shipping them out.

The large logs in the sand actually help with the strong tides.

After our tour, we had the chance to sample three different kinds of oysters. Learning about the different sizes and flavors came in handy later in our trip when we ordered oysters at dinner.

Demonstrating how to properly remove the oyster from the shell.

Oyster farms.

After our tour of Le Ferme Marine de Cancale ended, we headed into the village for a few hours. There were so many shops and lunch places, but there was also a market of just raw oyster vendors. 

While we did not buy any oysters in Cancale, we did have a Beignet Nutella, which may very well be the single best thing I've ever tasted in my entire life.

Cancale experiences some of the most dramatic tides in Europe. As part of the Mont-Saint-Michel bay, the incoming water rushes in rapidly, altering the local oyster farms and coastal landscape significantly within just a few hours. When the water recedes, fishing boats and sail boats are left sitting on the dry, muddy ocean floor, which was something that was odd to see when we were there.