The air smells of salt and seaweed. The Channel wind pushes fast-moving clouds over the granite bell towers, the tide uncovers and then covers the slipways of the old port, and the light changes from one minute to the next. That's how Roscoff introduces itself, at the tip of Finistère: a small Breton town full of character, built by privateer shipowners and turned toward the sea for five centuries.

From Bloscon to the old town

Ships call at the port of Bloscon, a deep-water basin about two kilometres east of the old centre. The trip is made by shuttle or by a half-hour walk along the coast, with the Île de Batz in your sights. Once in town, everything happens on foot in a small area: granite lanes, the quays of the old port, gardens battered by sea spray.

A shipowners' town

In the 16th century, the maritime trade in linen cloth made the town's fortune, and the stone still bears witness to it. Shipowners' houses line up their carved granite façades around the church, some adorned with ships engraved above their doors. The Church of Notre-Dame de Croaz-Batz, with its openwork Renaissance bell tower, among the most elegant in Brittany, watches over the ensemble; stone caravels carved on its walls are a reminder of who paid for its construction. Around it, alleyways lead to the slipways, where boats lie on their sides on the sand at low tide.

The Johnnies, onion sellers on bicycles

The town cherishes a history no one expects: that of the Johnnies, farmers who, from the 19th century on, sailed for England every summer with braids of pink onions and sold them door to door, on foot and later by bicycle. The British nicknamed them "Onion Johnnies," and their silhouette on a bike laden with braids became, across the Channel, an image of all of France. The Maison des Johnnies et de l'Oignon de Roscoff tells this modest and flavourful saga; the local pink onion, sweet and fragrant, now has a protected designation of origin. You'll find braids of it in all the good shops in town.

Île de Batz, fifteen minutes across the water

Facing the quays, the island can be reached by a short boat crossing. It can be explored on foot or by bike between pale sandy beaches, coastal trails and fields of early vegetables. Its hidden treasure: the Georges Delaselle Garden, an exotic garden created more than a century ago, where palm trees and southern-hemisphere plants thrive thanks to the mildness of the Gulf Stream. The lighthouse, at the island's highest point, rewards the climb with a full panorama of the Bay of Morlaix. The excursion takes half a day and is one of the loveliest surprises on Brittany's north coast.

Crêpes, fish auctions and marine wellness

The town's crêperies serve buckwheat galettes and salted-butter crêpes, accompanied by farmhouse cider. Maritime history buffs will note the figure of Mary, Queen of Scots, who landed here as a child in 1548 to marry the Dauphin of France: an old house still bears her name. Finally, Roscoff takes pride in being the birthplace of French thalassotherapy in the late 19th century; seawater still heals here, in the spas facing the bay.

Leaving the tip of Brittany

At departure time, the bell tower of Croaz-Batz fades behind the breakwater, the neighbouring island lights its lighthouse, and the wind has the last word, as always in Brittany. Roscoff has neither ramparts nor palaces; it has something better: an intact identity, made of granite, pink onions and sea stories that you bring home like seashells.