Looking at a map of Nice, I had spotted the city's other main railway station, that of the Chemins de Fer de Provence, with a line that heads up the valley of the River Var. And so, having discovered that the line is served by little diesel railcars, Ros and I had decided to take an excursion. Agreeing to meet one of Ros's colleagues and her husband, whom we had met at London City on the way out, it was decided that we would catch the 12:55 train to Entrevaux, famed for its medieval building and Vauban-designed fortifications.
The day was grey and rain and low cloud threatened, but we set off with little idea of what to expect. The River Var is a braided river, with channels of water separated by pebbled sandbanks, which join and separate seemingly at random, and acts as the main route from the Cote d'Azur over the Alps to Gap and the towns beyond. Entrevaux was clearly intended to deter invaders from using the route to reach the heart of France, and so we suspected that it might be quite dramatic.
And indeed it was, with the old town entered via a narrow bridge high over the Var, with all of the arrow slits and little structures designed to command a large area at little risk to the defenders. Above all of this, on top of the cliff face, a bastion designed to be impregnable, assessable only via a path which zigzags up the side of the cliff. It was seriously impressive, and I for one would probably have thought long and hard before assaying an attack.
The town is about halfway along the train line from Nice to the town of Digne-les-Bains, and during the winter appears to be predominantly shut - I suspect that it is crowded with tourists in the summer. If you're in the area, I couldn't recommend it more.
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