Grez-en-Bouère with the Baladins du Moulin

The Baladins du Moulin held their general assembly last night for the country of Meslay-Grez. Baladins avec un l, that’s the ride. It’s also a ballad pun, 2l, which is a sung poem or romance. In a way, an ode to nature. But why the mill. Simply because in Grez-en-Bouère, there is a one-of-a-kind mill, a cavier mill like we see especially in Anjou where many are ruined.

The cavier is a cellar, a tapered base where the flour is collected after the grains have been crushed by millstones. The mill is a source of energy that does not require the strength of man or animal. But it is still necessary to control this force according to the orientation of the winds coming mainly from the southwest, that is to say from the Atlantic. This is why the miller turns the wooden cabin called the hucherolle and which surmounts the tapered base to capture the wind energy when he needs to fill his bags with flour intended for the baker who makes him this daily bread. the French are so fond of it.

Our youthful mill proudly wears windshield aids that replaced the sails. Its location is at La Guénaudière, named after the man Guénaud dating from the 12th century. It was built in 1827 and corresponds to a type developed at least since the 16th century. It had ceased to function in 1900 and was put back in value in 1987. If the first windmills date from the Gallic period, their development corresponds especially to the Middle Ages with a majority of water mills, subjected to the flow of the streams and rivers, regulated by diversion bays fed by water reservoirs. In each municipality and on each river, there are several of these artificial dams above ponds that are often silted up and transformed into meadows. Water and windmills are therefore complementary but their need is extinguished with electrification.

I guess you now want to see this mill in perfect condition on site in Grez-en-Bouère. Good thing, the new Mayenne sunken roads topo-guide will be distributed in bookstores and supermarkets from next Tuesday. A hiking circuit is presented on page 105 and passes precisely to the Guénaudière mill, the location of which is also indicated on the Grez à Meslay road. With the Baladins du Moulin, as a family or alone, let’s conquer wind power.