Last week we had friends staying who had never visited this area of France before and they quite literally toured the Charente Maritime from north to south, and from east to west. They marveled at our incredible beaches which stretch for miles along the Atlantic coast, backed by sand dunes and pine forests; they loved the Île d’Oléron perhaps even more than the Île de Ré; they had great fun in Cognac, Royan and La Rochelle; they even found time to visit local châteaux and some street markets.  But every evening I would ask them, “Have you been to Rochefort yet?”, and the answer was always an apologetic “No”.

Every day they meant to, and on their last day it really was their plan to go and have lunch there and idle away a few hours. Alas for Rochefort, the sky was the clearest blue we had seen for a week and a last day at the beach won hands down. It was unfortunate that they left without having set foot in our lovely old town, just a mere ten minutes away. So yesterday, without them knowing but on their behalf, we decided to become tourists for a few hours and see Rochefort afresh through the eyes of a visitor. As it was a Wednesday the children had no school in the afternoon and so we headed to our favourite restaurant for lunch armed with my camera and discussed where to go.

Yvonne and Neil, this photo tour of Rochefort is for you and hopefully next time you will see it for real!

To start with, we parked opposite the grand imposing Baroque post-office,

and wandered down the Rue Audry-de-Puyravault past the Eglise St Louis. The church was originally built in the Neo-classical style in 1662 on the site of the old Capuchin Chapel but was rebuilt as it stands today in 1835.

From here we walked across into the Place Colbert

and stopped for some lunch at our favourite haunt, La Terrasse Colbert

The Place Colbert features a beautiful fountain built in 1750

and there are numerous places to sit and watch the world go by, to drink a tea or coffee or sip an apéritif

Rochefort is a 17th Century town chosen by Jean-Baptiste Colbert as a place of “refuge, defense and supply” for the French Navy. It was Louis XIV who was especially keen to get a shipyard built in Rochefort – he was worried about the power of the English navy and instructed Colbert to “Make it big, make it beautiful – and make it fast.”

The result of all this military planning is that Rochefort today has a rather grand feel with its wide boulevards and straight streets. The town is often overshadowed by its seaside neighbours of La Rochelle to the north and Royan to the south, and as a result is often neglected by visitors to the area which is a great shame as it is both stylish and enchanting.

The town Hall, known as an Hotel de Ville in France and not to be confused with a real Hotel, is an imposing building on the western side of the Place Colbert.

After a delicious lunch we took a stroll past some of the many shops lining the square

and then headed down the Rue de la République

past the beautifully restored Théâtre de la Coupe d’Or

and the imposing Centre des Finances Publiques

past offices and private houses

and down to the Corderie Royal, which as it’s name suggests used to be where ropes were made for the navy.  At the time the building (which was started in 1666 and completed in 1669) was the longest building in Europe at 473 metres in length.  The navy needed to be supplied with ropes of 200 metres long, hence the great length of the building. Today it is a naval heritage museum.

We passed tourists taking a more leisurely view of the town

and continued to the formal French gardens

overlooking the River Charente and the surrounding farmland, which borders the town in many places

Then we walked down to the Musée National de la Marine which is one of the main naval museums in France

where the girls pretended to be Napoléon and Joséphine

Finally we stopped by the Hermione, a replica of the ship which became famous when she ferried the French military officer the Marquis de Lafayette to the United States in 1780 for support to the rebels in the American Revolutionary War. She was grounded and wrecked in 1793. In 1997 her replica was started in Rochefort. She was completed last year and in April 2015 she began her return voyage to the USA arriving safely on the American coast in June.  In August she returned to Rochefort amongst many celebrations.

There are plenty of places we didn’t have time to visit as the girls had to get to their tennis lessons, but it was great fun being tourists for an afternoon and we will do it again, somewhere else next month.  If there is anywhere in particular someone wants to see let me know, it’s always a fabulous excuse to see somewhere new, or in this case re-explore somewhere we already knew rather well!