| The megaliths of Carnac make up three distinct major alignments, running roughly in the same northeast–southwest direction, but each with a slightly separate orientation. These are the Alignements de Menec, "the place of stones" or "place of remembrance", with 1169 stones in eleven rows; the Alignements de Kermario, "the place of the dead", with 1029 stones in ten rows; and the Alignements de Kerlescan, "the place of burning", with 555 stones in thirteen lines. All three are sited parallel to the sea alongside the Route des Alignements, 1km or so to the north of Carnac-Ville. Thanks to increasing numbers of visitors, however, the principal alignments have been fenced off, and you're not free to wander at will among them. The area is being allowed to re-vegetate, but there's no predicting how long that will take, and access may well still be restricted when it's complete. For the moment, a visitor centre at the Alignements de Kermario (daily: May & June 9am–7pm; July & Aug 9am–8pm; Sept–April 10am–5.15pm; tel 02.97.52.89.99) sells books and maps of the site, and holds an interesting scale model; a larger facility is due to be constructed in the near future. The stones themselves are clearly visible on the far side of the fence, though thanks to their destruction and displacement by generations of meddling humans, and several millennia of Breton winters, many look like no more than stumps in the heather. It has become hard to see any real consistency in the size or the shape of individual stones, or enough regularity in the lines to pinpoint their direction. There are several distinct types of megalithic monuments. Menhirs, or "standing stones", range in size from mere stumps to five-metre-high blocks; some stand alone, others in circles known as cromlechs, or in approximate lines. In addition there are dolmens, groups of standing stones roofed with further stones laid across the top, which are generally assumed to be burial chambers. And there are tumuli – most notably the Tumulus de St-Michel, near the town centre, a vast artificial mound containing rudimentary graves. You can scramble through subterranean passages and tunnels beneath the mound to view little stone cairns and piles of charred bones; the tunnels are, however, not authentic, being the recent creation of archeologists. Carnac's Musée de Préhistoire, at 10 place de la Chapelle in town (May–Sept Mon–Fri 10am–6.30pm, Sat & Sun 10am–noon & 2–6.30pm; rest of year daily except Tues 10am–noon & 2–5pm; April–Sept €5, rest of year €4), is a disappointingly dry museum of archeology that's likely to leave anyone whose command of French is less than perfect almost completely in the dark as to what all the fuss is about. It traces the history of the area from earliest times, starting with 450,000-year-old chipping tools and leading by way of the Neanderthals to the megalith builders and beyond. As well as authentic physical relics, it holds reproductions and casts of the carvings at Locmariaquer, a scale model of the Alignements de Menec and diagrams of how the stones may have been moved into place.
| 
