Nantes

Nantes was the seat of the Dukes of Brittany, then France's largest slave-trading port, then an industrial shipbuilding city, and it has spent the last thirty years turning all of that into something else. The shipyards on the Île de Nantes now house a workshop that builds enormous mechanical animals; a permanent green line painted on the pavement links every artwork in the city; and the Mémorial de l'Abolition de l'Esclavage on the quay confronts the port's history directly rather than quietly.

Because it is the most inventive city in France and the least like anywhere else. The Grand Éléphant is twelve metres tall, carries fifty passengers, walks, and sprays water from its trunk — and it is not a novelty bolted on to a normal city but the centre of a genuine cultural strategy that has been running since 2007. It also has a ducal château in the middle of town and the Loire estuary an hour downstream.

Loire-Atlantique (44), Pays de la Loire

Things to do

• Les Machines de l'Île — The Grand Éléphant, the Galerie des Machines and the three-storey marine carousel. Book the elephant ride separately.
• Château des ducs de Bretagne — A fortress outside, a Renaissance palace inside, and the city museum — including an unflinching room on the slave trade.
• Le Voyage à Nantes — Follow the green line for 12 km past permanent and summer artworks. Free, and the best way to read the city.
• Mémorial de l'Abolition de l'Esclavage — Below the quay, 2,000 glass plaques naming the slave ships that left this port. Quiet and hard.
• Passage Pommeraye — A three-level nineteenth-century shopping arcade built into a hillside. There is nothing else quite like it.
• Trentemoult — Ten minutes on the river shuttle to a village of pink, green and yellow houses facing back at the city.

3 days in Nantes

1. Day 1 Château and island

   Château des ducs in the morning, then the cathedral and Bouffay. Cross to the Île de Nantes after lunch for the Machines and the carousel. Aperitif on the quay.

2. Day 2 The green line

   Follow the line from the station through Graslin and the Passage Pommeraye to the Musée d'Arts. Navibus to Trentemoult in the late afternoon and eat on the water.

3. Day 3 Loire or coast

   Upstream to Angers and Saumur for the châteaux, or downstream to Guérande's salt marshes and La Baule's nine-kilometre beach.

Practical

Best time to go

May–September; the Voyage à Nantes art trail runs July–August and is when the city is at full volume. The Machines workshop is open year-round but the elephant does not run in high wind. Winter is mild and wet.

Getting there

TGV Paris–Nantes in 2h. Nantes Atlantique airport is 20 min by shuttle. Rennes is an hour, Bordeaux four, La Rochelle two. The Loire à Vélo cycle route ends here.

Getting around

Three tram lines, a busway and a flat centre. The Navibus river shuttle counts as public transport and crosses the Loire. The green line on the pavement is a genuinely good walking route — follow it and you will see most of the city.

Eat & drink

Beurre blanc was invented here, and it goes on pike from the Loire. Muscadet is the local wine — bone dry, cheap, and much better than its reputation. The Marché de Talensac is the best market in western France. Also: LU biscuits, whose factory tower is now an arts centre.

Know before you go

The Machines de l'Île sells timed tickets for the elephant separately from the gallery, and summer slots go days ahead. Nantes is administratively in Pays de la Loire but historically Breton, and locals will tell you which they consider correct — the château is called the Château des ducs de Bretagne for a reason.