The Most Beautiful Places in Finistère
6 places · updated 13 October 2026
In short: By our ranking, the most beautiful places in Finistère are Pointe du Raz, Saint-Mathieu Lighthouse and Calvary at Guimiliau. The list covers 6 places. Last updated 13 October 2026.
Finistère takes its name from the Latin for the end of the earth, and its Breton name, Penn-ar-Bed, means the head of the world. It is the far western tip of Brittany, a granite peninsula battered by the Atlantic, scattered with reefs and islands and guarded by lighthouses. Inland, the wealth of the linen and cloth trade in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries paid for village churchyards of astonishing ambition, the Breton parish closes.
Pointe du Raz is a narrow ridge of rock running out toward the Île de Sein, above the Raz de Sein, a strait known for its violent currents. At Pointe Saint-Mathieu, a lighthouse rises beside the ruins of a medieval abbey at the entrance to the roadstead of Brest. Far offshore near Ouessant, La Jument Lighthouse stands on a reef in open sea, famous for photographs of giant waves breaking around its tower.
The parish closes show the other face of Finistère. At Guimiliau, the calvary carries some two hundred carved granite figures telling the life and Passion of Christ. The calvary at Plougastel-Daoulas was raised in the early seventeenth century after an outbreak of plague, and Saint-Thégonnec combines a triumphal gateway, ossuary and calvary into one of the most complete closes in Brittany. Wild sea and devout village carving belong to the same small land.
In this list
| # | Place | Type | UNESCO |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Pointe du Raz | Cliff | |
| 2 | Saint-Mathieu Lighthouse | Lighthouse | |
| 3 | Calvary at Guimiliau | Wayside shrine | |
| 4 | Calvary at Plougastel-Daoulas | Wayside shrine | |
| 5 | La Jument Lighthouse | Lighthouse | |
| 6 | Calvary at Saint-Thégonnec | Wayside shrine |
01 Pointe du Raz
France48.040° N 4.741° W
Jean-Pol GRANDMONT · CC BY-SA 4.0 At the far western end of Cap Sizun, the granite of Brittany narrows into a jagged blade of rock that runs out into the Atlantic. The Pointe du Raz rises about 72 metres above the sea and drops away in broken cliffs and scree towards the water, where waves break constantly over the reefs.
Did you know? A marble statue of Notre-Dame-des-Naufragés, Our Lady of the Shipwrecked, by the sculptor Cyprian Godebski stands on the headland.
02 Saint-Mathieu Lighthouse
Phare de Saint-Mathieu
France · 21.5 km from Brest48.330° N 4.771° W
JackyM59 · CC BY-SA 4.0 Few lighthouses stand in company as strange as Saint-Mathieu's. The white tower with its red crown rises straight out of the ruined nave of a Benedictine abbey on the Pointe Saint-Mathieu, the cliff-edged headland at the western tip of Brittany where the Iroise sea meets the approaches to Brest.
Did you know? In 1771 the comte d'Estaing had the lantern fitted with large panes of Bohemian glass, double-wick lamps burning fish and rapeseed oil, and polished metal reflectors.
03 Calvary at Guimiliau
Calvaire de Guimiliau
France · 38.4 km from Brest48.488° N 3.997° W
Hyppolyte de Saint-Rambert · CC BY-SA 4.0 Guimiliau is a small village in the Finistère countryside, yet its parish close around the church of Saint-Miliau is one of the finest in Brittany, and its calvary is often called the most populous of them all.
Did you know? According to legend, Katell Gollet was a young woman who took the devil as her lover and stole a consecrated host for him, which sent her to hell.
04 Calvary at Plougastel-Daoulas
Calvaire de Plougastel-Daoulas
France · 9.4 km from Brest48.374° N 4.370° W
Duch.seb · CC BY-SA 3.0 In the middle of Plougastel-Daoulas, a market town on the peninsula across the Elorn estuary from Brest, stands one of the great calvaries of Brittany: a ten-metre stone stage crowded with 182 figures.
Did you know? Among the figures are Breton peasants in bragou-braz, the baggy breeches of the region, and a bagpipe player.
05 La Jument Lighthouse
Phare de la Jument
France48.422° N 5.134° W
Falken · CC BY-SA 3.0 La Jument is the lighthouse of the famous storm photograph: a slim stone tower on a reef off Ushant, the island at the westernmost edge of Brittany, with a wall of white water rising around it and a keeper standing in the open doorway.
Did you know? In September 1974 a wave smashed into the lantern itself, forcing the two keepers on duty to take refuge lower in the tower.
06 Calvary at Saint-Thégonnec
Calvaire de Saint-Thégonnec
France48.520° N 3.947° W
Gerhard Haubold · CC BY-SA 3.0 Saint-Thégonnec, a village in northern Finistère south-west of Morlaix, owns one of the richest parish closes in Brittany: a walled churchyard entered through a Renaissance triumphal gateway, with an ossuary chapel, the church of Notre-Dame and, at its heart, a calvary dated 1610.
Did you know? In the pietà on the back of the cross, the Virgin holds her dead son's hand, with the wound of the nail clearly carved in it.
How this list is ranked
Places are chosen for how they look, not for how famous they are: each one has its own description and a photograph credited to its author. The order is a single world ranking that weighs the beauty of the place in curated photography together with how widely it is documented — the number of language editions of its encyclopedia article and how often that article is read in a year. The list is rebuilt as places are added, so the order and the counts on this page are always current.
Questions people ask
- What are the most beautiful places in Finistère?
- On our list, Pointe du Raz ranks first, followed by Saint-Mathieu Lighthouse and Calvary at Guimiliau.
- What does Finistère mean?
- The name comes from the Latin finis terrae, meaning end of the earth, because the peninsula is the westernmost part of Brittany and of mainland France.
- What is a Breton parish close?
- A parish close, or enclos paroissial, is a walled churchyard grouping a church, a calvary, an ossuary and a monumental gateway, built mostly in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries in western Brittany.
- Why was the Plougastel-Daoulas calvary built?
- It was erected in the early seventeenth century as a votive offering following an epidemic of plague that struck the parish in 1598.
- What kinds of places are there to see in Finistère?
- In our collection, the places in Finistère are most often wayside shrines (3), lighthouses (2) and cliffs (1).
- How many places are on this list in Finistère?
- The list covers 6 places.