On the N137, 32 km S of La Rochelle. On the River Charente, 15 km inland from the sea, Rochefort was commissioned as a safe port and arsenal by Louis XIV’s Minister for the Navy, Colbert. The town was built from scratch between 1665-72, and its military bearing is immediately obvious in the neat grid of streets and sturdy architecture. The most unusual edifice is the Corderie Royale, rue Toufaire, the longest building in France at 374 m, former site of the royal rope-works. At one end the Centre International de la Mer houses rope-making and maritime displays, and the surrounding gardens abound with foreign species brought back by sailors. A short walk away, the Musée national de la Marine, place de la Gallossinnière, bulges at the seams with figureheads, sextants and assorted nautical odds and ends.

On a rather different tack, 19thC novelist ‘Pierre Loti’ sailed the Seven Seas as a career naval officer named Julien Viaud before settling down in Rochefort. His travels provided suitably exotic backgrounds for a series of romantic novels and also furnished the Maison de Pierre Loti, which is sadly no longer open to the public.