A CHANCE meeting between a Breton farmer and an Ashburton haulier in a Cleder bar in 1971 was the embryo of a long-standing link between the Devon and Brittany towns.

Louis Mesguen and Fred Miner's lorries passed regularly on their way to and from the ports after Brittany Ferries had set up its link to Plymouth and both had been thinking along the same lines – that their two towns would make ideal twinning partners.

Louis could not speak English and it was vice versa regarding the French tongue, but with some hand gestures and several glasses of wine later, Louis succeeded in getting his message across to Fred that Cleder would like to twin with a town similar to Ashburton.

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