Obviously the pictures above are not mine (how could they be, I have just explained that we have not yet had sight of these edifices) so another reprimand might be expected for my use of these images here (they are borrowed from The Lighthouse Directory). I apologise if the originators feel I have overstepped the mark by displaying their fine work in my post but I do not pretend that they are mine in any way: they are not.
NB I include the two jetty lights at Boulogne in the first cameo above to give a further indication of what can be found at this major fishing-port and because the green one is made of plastic, or fibre-glass! Really, what an indignity. There are other plastic harbour lights — in Toulon fgs!
In the case of Pontusval, I think we actually passed it by as a minor harbour light, not realising that even though it is clearly modest, it nevertheless deserves consideration as it seems to exhibit most of what makes a phare a phare, modestly but very picturesquely, I am sure you would agree…
Brignogan-Plage? Almost directly west (about 26km) of Roscoff. If using the A4 wiro bound Michelin Atlas of France, pp70-71 the lighthouse is right in the gutter, the name of its location being part on p70, (Pointe du Pontu) part on p71, (sval). There is further confusion with Michelin which doesn't indicate Pointe de Beg Pol at all but instead calls the location Pointe du Pontusval. So that might also have contributed to us missing the phare 'in the field' as it were…… plans are afoot to make amends…
(update: Pontusval was duly ticked off, autumn 2021 and is referred to in an adjacent appendix where I manage to misname it: go find).
There may be more phares to come in this post-of-shame…
… but here is a 'postcard' featuring a harbour light only a few kilometres beyond Roscoff, visited twice in association with our use of Roscoff as our port of entry and exit. The little (former) fishing port of Moguériec. This is not a lighthouse, this is a feu (antérieur — indicating there is a postérieur also, which in this case is just a feu on a pole). This is specifically a tourelle, a 19C. cast iron prefab. I offer it up as a good example of this particular french design ingenuity and pattern: we have come across similar feux in several places. There is a red and white specimen at Séte, for example… Moguériec's feu is in need of some tlc, but I understand it is going to get some in the near future. Bravo.
Yes! Good news. Moguériec was dismantled, repaired and restored with appropriate light. The people spoke! Here it is in 2026… there seems to have been some holiday development since we overnighted there… on the other side of the harbour to that of the centre of the village.
