Historic Quarter Sights
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Le Panier
From the Vieux Port, hike north up to this fantastic history-woven quarter, dubbed Marseille’s Montmartre as much for its sloping streets as its artsy ambience. In Greek Massilia it was the site of the agora (marketplace), hence its name, which means ‘the basket’. During WWII the quarter was dynamited and afterwards rebuilt. Today it’s a mishmash of lanes hiding artisan shops, ateliers (workshops) and terraced houses strung with drying washing.
Its centerpiece is Centre de la Vieille Charité; nearby Cathédrale de la Major stands guard between the old and ‘new’ ports with a ‘stripy’ facade made of local Cassis stone and green Florentine marble. Creative art…
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Vieil Aix
Art, culture and architecture abound in Aix and is a stroller’s paradise, especially the mostly pedestrian old city, Vieil Aix.
The graceful cours Mirabeau is the heart of Aix. Cafés spill onto the sidewalks on the sunny northern side. The southern side shelters a string of elegant Renaissance hôtels particuliers (private mansions). The mossy fontaine d’Eau Thermale, at the intersection of cours Mirabeau and rue du 4 Septembre, spouts 34°C water, a pleasant hint of what awaits at the Thermes Sextius.
South of cours Mirabeau, Quartier Mazarin was laid out in the 17th century, and is home to some of Aix’ finest buildings. Further south still is the peaceful parc…
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Petite France
Criss-crossed by narrow lanes, canals and locks, impossibly pretty Petite France is where craftsmen plied their trades in the Middle Ages. The half-timbered houses, sprouting veritable thickets of scarlet geraniums in summer, and the riverside parks attract the masses, but the area still manages to retain its Alsatian atmosphere and charm, especially in the early morning and late evening.
Drink in views of the River Ill and the mighty 17th-century Barrage Vauban (Vauban Dam), recently undergoing renovation, from the much-photographed Ponts Couverts (Covered Bridges) and their trio of 13th-century towers.
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La Ponche
Shrug off the hustle of the port in St-Tropez’s ramshackle fishing quarter, La Ponche, northeast of the Vieux Port. From the southern end of quai Frédéric Mistral, place Garrezio sprawls east from 10th-century Tour Suffren to place de l’Hôtel de Ville. From here, rue Guichard leads southeast to sweet-chiming Église de St-Tropez, a St-Trop landmark built in 1785 in Italian baroque style. Inside is the bust of St Torpes, honoured during Les Bravades des Espagnols.
Follow rue du Portail Neuf south to Chapelle de la Miséricorde, built in 1645 with a pretty bell tower and colourful tiled dome.
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Aître St-Maclou
For a macabre thrill, check out the courtyard of this curious ensemble of half-timbered buildings built between 1526 and 1533. Decorated with lurid woodcarvings of skulls, crossbones, gravediggers' tools and hourglasses, it was used as a burial ground for plague victims as recently as 1781. Aître St-Maclou now houses the regional École des Beaux-Arts (School of Fine Arts).
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Grande Île
History seeps through winding lanes dotted with candy-coloured half-timbered houses and vibrant café-rimmed squares in the Unesco World Heritage site of Grande Île, a place made for aimless ambling. These ancient streets cower beneath the soaring magnificence of the cathedral and its sidekick, the gingerbready 15th-century Maison Kammerzell, with its ornate carvings and leaded windows. The alleys are at their most atmospheric when lantern-lit at night.
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Vieux Port
Ships have docked for more than 26 centuries at the city’s birthplace, the colourful Old Port. The main commercial docks were transferred to the Joliette area north of here in the 1840s, but the old port remains a thriving harbour for fishing boats, pleasure yachts and tourists. The free Cross-Port Ferry in front of the town hall is a fun way to get out on the water, however briefly.
Guarding the harbour are Bas Fort St-Nicolas on the south side and, across the water, Fort St-Jean, founded in the 13th century by the Knights Hospitaller of St John of Jerusalem, and home of the national Musée des Civilisations de l’Europe et de la Méditerranée's brand new…
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Vieil Antibes
Vieil Antibes is a pleasant mix of food shops, boutiques and restaurants. Mornings are a good time to meander along the little alleyways, when the Marché Provençal is in full swing. Check out the views from the sea walls, stretching from the urban sprawl of Nice to the snowy peaks of the Alps and nearby Cap d’Antibes.
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Barrio Gótico
On the fringes of León's Old Town, Plaza de San Marcelo is home to the ayuntamiento (town hall), which occupies a charmingly compact Renaissance-era palace. The Renaissance theme continues in the form of the splendid Palacio de los Guzmanes (1560), where the facade and patio stand out; the latter is accessible only on a free guided tour that leaves most hours. Next door is Antoni Gaudí's contribution to León's skyline, the castle-like, neo-Gothic Casa de Botines (1893). The zany architect of Barcelona fame seems to have been subdued by sober León and a statue of the great man adorns a park bench at the front.
Down the hill, the delightful Plaza de Santa María del…
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Piccola Venezia
The area known as Piccola Venezia or 'Little Venice' is crossed with small canals built during the 17th century using Venetian methods of reclaiming land from the sea. Fortezza Nuova, built for the Medici court in the late 16th century, is the quarter's main attraction although little of it remains bar a park inside and its sturdy old walls out. Canals link it with the Fortezza Vecchia, constructed 60 years earlier on the site of an 11th-century building, on the waterfront. Deeply cracked and crumbling, it looks as though it might give up and slide into the sea at any moment.
Much more fun is to walk or jump on a tour boat and explore the waterways flanked by faded,…
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Vieille Ville
Menton’s old town is a cascade of pastel-coloured buildings. Meander the historic quarter all the way to the Cimetière du Vieux Château for great views. From place du Cap a ramp leads to southern France's grandest baroque church, the Italianate Basilique St-Michel Archange, its creamy facade flanked by a 35m-tall clock tower and 53m-tall steeple (1701–03).
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Vieil Aix
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Le Vieux Port & Le Suquet
On the western side of the Palais des Festivals lies the real Cannes. The yachts that frame the Vieux Port are the only reminder that this is where celebrities holiday, but they don’t seem to impress the pensioners playing pétanque on square Lord Brougham. Follow rue St-Antoine and snake your way up Le Suquet, Cannes's oldest district, for great views of the bay.
For local folklore head to Marché Forville, a couple of blocks back from the port. It's one of the most important markets in the region and the supplier of choice for restaurants (and for your picnic!).
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Le Rocher
Monaco Ville, also called Le Rocher, thrusts skywards on a pistol-shaped rock. It’s this strategic location, overlooking the sea, that became the stronghold of the Grimaldi dynasty. Built as a fortress in the 13th century, the palace is now the private residence of the Grimaldis. It is protected by the Carabiniers du Prince; changing of the guard takes place daily at 11.55am.
Le Rocher is the only part of Monaco to have retained small, winding medieval lanes; they tend to be overrun with souvenir and ice-cream shops but it does give a sense of what Monaco once was.
To access Le Rocher, walk up the 16th-century red-brick Rampe Major from place aux Armes in the Condamine…
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Cours Mirabeau
No avenue better epitomises Provence’s most graceful city than fountain-studded cours Mirabeau, sprinkled with elegant Renaissance hôtels particuliers and crowned with a summertime roof of leafy plane trees. Named after the revolutionary hero Comte de Mirabeau, it was laid out in the 1640s. Cézanne and Zola famously hung out at Les Deux Garçons, one of a clutch of pavement cafes. It buzzes with people-watchers despite its elevated prices and mediocre food.
Among the most impressive hôtels particuliers is Hôtel d’Espargnet (1647) at No 38, now home to the university’s economics department. Photography and contemporary art gets an airing inside Hôtel de…
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Vieille Ville & Lakefront
It's a pleasure simply to wander aimlessly around Annecy's medieval old town, a photogenic jumble of narrow streets, turquoise canals and colonnaded passageways. Continue down to the tree-fringed lakefront and the flowery Jardins de l'Europe, linked to the popular picnic spot Champ de Mars by the poetic iron arch of the Pont des Amours (Lovers' Bridge).
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Terra Vecchia
A network of narrow lanes leads south towards the old port and the neighbourhood of Terra Vecchia, a muddle of crumbling apartments and balconied blocks. The shady place de l'Hôtel de Ville hosts Bastia's lively morning market from Tuesday to Saturday. One block to the west, don't miss the baroque Chapelle de l'Immaculée Conception, with its elaborately painted barrel-vaulted ceiling; it briefly served as the seat of the short-lived Anglo-Corsican parliament in 1795. Further north isChapelle St-Roch, known for its 18th-century organ and trompe l'œil roof.
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Quartier de la Cité
In the heart of the old city, Cathédrale St-Maurice is one of the earliest examples of Plantagenet or Angevin architecture in France, distinguished by its rounded ribbed vaulting, 15th-century stained glass and a 12th-century portal depicting the Day of Judgment. Across the square from the cathedral on place Ste-Croix is the Maison d'Adam (c 1500), one of the city's best-preserved medieval houses, decorated with a riot of carved, bawdy figurines. From the square in front of the cathedral a monumental staircase, the Montée St-Maurice, leads down to the river.
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Vieux Nice
Nice’s old town, a mellow rabbit warren, has scarcely changed since the 1700s. Retracing its history – and therefore that of the city – is a highlight, although you don’t need to be a history buff to enjoy a stroll in this atmospheric quarter. Vieux Nice is as alive and prominent today as it ever was.
Cue the cours Saleya: this joyous, thriving market square hosts a well-known flower market and a thriving fruit and vegetable market, a staple of local life. A flea market takes over on Mondays, and the spillover from bars and restaurants seems to be a permanent fixture.
Much of Vieux Nice has a similar atmosphere to cours Saleya, with delis, food shops, boutiques and…
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Quartier Impérial
The stately boulevards and bourgeois villas of the German Imperial Quarter, including rue Gambetta and av Foch, are the brainchild of Kaiser Wilhelm II. Built to trumpet the triumph of Metz' post-1871 status as part of the Second Reich, the architecture is a whimsical mix of art deco, neo-Romanesque and neo-Renaissance influences. The area's unique ensemble of Wilhelmian architecture has made it a candidate for Unesco World Heritage status.
Philippe Starck lampposts juxtapose Teutonic sculptures, whose common theme is German imperial might, at the monumental Rhenish neo-Romanesque train station, completed in 1908.
The massive main post office, built in 1911 of red Vosges…
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Old City
Despite serious damage by German attacks in 1940, Blois' old city is worth exploring, especially around the 17th-century Cathédrale St-Louis, with its lovely multistoreyed bell tower, dramatically floodlit after dark. Most of the stained glass inside was installed by Dutch artist Jan Dibberts in 2000.
Across the square, the facade of Maison des Acrobates is decorated with wooden sculptures taken from medieval farces, and one of the few 15th-century houses to survive. There's another example at No 13 called Hôtel de Villebrême.
Lovely panoramas unfold across town from the peaceful Jardins de l'Évêché and the top of the Escalier Denis Papin.
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Le Suquet
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