France
Macon
Mâcon: A Saône River Town in Burgundy's White-Wine Country
Mâcon sits on the west bank of the Saône in southern Burgundy, and it gave its name to the Mâconnais, a wine district where almost all the wine is white and made from Chardonnay. The town center is small, so walking is the easiest way to get around.
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Arriving in Mâcon
River cruise ships moor along the quays of the Saône, and hotel boats stop at the quai des Marans, the town's main river port. The town center reaches from Place de la Barre down to the river and holds the cathedral, the main churches and both of the town's museums.
- Most of the shops are in the streets near the town hall, among them rue Carnot, rue Dufour and the quai Lamartine.
- Mâcon-Ville station, in the center, has regional trains toward Dijon, Lyon and Bourg-en-Bresse. High-speed TGV trains stop at Mâcon-Loché, about 10 km out of town.
- Lyon is 65 km to the south.
- Mâcon is the prefecture of the Saône-et-Loire department and the southernmost town of the Bourgogne-Franche-Comté region.
Mâcon on Your Own
The center of Mâcon is small, so the riverside, the old cathedral and a museum can all be reached on foot. Start by the water and walk inland into the older streets.
- Esplanade Lamartine: The riverside square has a statue of the poet Alphonse de Lamartine, and a line from his poem Le Lac, "Ô temps suspends ton vol", is set into the paving in silver letters.
- Vieux Saint-Vincent: On rue de Strasbourg, the western end of the old cathedral survives under two octagonal towers of different heights, after the rest was partly pulled down during the Revolution. Its porch shelters a carved Last Judgment from the early 12th century.
- Maison de bois: This wooden house on the pedestrian street, built between 1490 and 1510, is thought to be the oldest house in town, and a café now uses it.
- Musée des Ursulines: Housed in a 17th-century convent on rue des Ursulines, the museum covers the region's archaeology, river and wine life, paintings, and the poet Lamartine. Check its opening days before you go.
- Across the river: The Pont Saint-Laurent, Mâcon's oldest bridge, leads over the Saône to Saint-Laurent-sur-Saône, which is easily reached on foot from the center.
- Getting back on time: All-aboard is usually about 30 minutes before sailing, and your ship posts the exact time. A ship will not wait for passengers touring on their own.
Food and Wine
The vineyards around Mâcon make mostly white wine from Chardonnay, and Pouilly-Fuissé is one of the district's appellations. The town also has two sweets of its own, a cream-filled meringue cake and a thin rolled wafer.
- Red and rosé Mâcon, made from Gamay and Pinot noir, account for only a small part of the district's wine.
- Pouilly-Fuissé comes from villages such as Fuissé, Solutré-Pouilly and Vergisson, which sit below limestone hills west of town.
- Saint-Véran and Viré-Clessé are two more white-wine appellations of the Mâconnais.
- L'idéal mâconnais is a meringue cake filled with butter cream, and the gaufrette mâconnaise is a very thin wafer rolled into the shape of a cigarette.
- East of the Saône, the Bresse is known for white poultry with its own AOC, and to the west the Charolais is known for its white cattle.
Tipping in France
Tipping is neither required nor expected in France, because the cost of service is included in menu prices by law. The currency is the euro.
- Most French people who do leave something simply round the bill up.
- If you do tip, it is a thank-you for outstanding service.
Lamartine and Summer by the River
The Romantic poet and politician Alphonse de Lamartine was born in Mâcon in 1790, and his name is on the riverside esplanade, a quay and a lycée. Each summer a free arts festival, Été frappé, fills the town with concerts, shows and open-air films, many of them on the esplanade by the Saône.
- Lamartine's funeral was held in the cathedral of Saint-Vincent on 4 March 1869.
- The Hôtel Senecé is still home to the Académie de Mâcon, a society of arts, sciences and letters founded in 1805.
- Été frappé runs through the summer, from about late June to the end of August.
- The Régates Mâconnaises rowing club organizes regional and national races each year, and the Musée des Ursulines has a section on rowing.
- The footballer Antoine Griezmann began his career at the local club, UF Mâconnais.
A Brief History
Mâcon began as a hill fort and river port of the Celtic Aedui, which the Romans knew as Matisco. For centuries its bridge over the Saône stood on a frontier, and since 1790 the town has been the capital of Saône-et-Loire.
- Matisco: The Aedui probably founded the settlement early in the first century BC. The Roman town grew quickly in the first two centuries AD and was given walls in the 4th century.
- The Mâcon Treasure: In 1764, workers digging the foundations of the Hôtel-Dieu found a hoard of about 30,000 gold coins, with silverware and statuettes from the years 260 to 270. What remains of it is in the British Museum.
- On the border: From 843 to 1600 the Mâconnais lay on the border between the Kingdom of France and the Holy Roman Empire. Louis IX of France bought the county in 1239.
- Early printing: In 1493 Michel Wenssler, a printer from Basel, produced two religious books here, making Mâcon one of the first towns in France with a press.
- Wars of Religion: Protestants sacked the old cathedral in September 1567.
- 1790: Lamartine was born in the town on 21 October, and the same year Mâcon became the seat of the new department of Saône-et-Loire.
- Second World War: Mâcon was the first town in the unoccupied zone between Paris and Lyon until German troops moved in on 11 November 1942. The town was liberated on 4 September 1944, a day after the retreating Germans and the Milice blew up the station and an arch of the Pont Saint-Laurent.
- The bridge saved: In the 1980s the Pont Saint-Laurent was threatened because it stopped bigger boats from passing. A bypass canal east of Saint-Laurent-sur-Saône, dug in the early 1990s, let it stay.
- To learn more ashore: The Musée des Ursulines, in the former Ursuline convent on rue des Ursulines, covers the archaeology and history of the town and its region.
Mâcon with Children
A family day in Mâcon can stay in the center, where the riverside, an old wooden house and a museum of prehistoric finds are all within walking distance. Older children can add the Rock of Solutré, a limestone cliff west of town.
- Younger children: Look for the silver letters set into the Esplanade Lamartine by the river. The Parc des Allumettes, in the south of town, has many play areas for children.
- School age: On the ground floor of the Musée des Ursulines, look for the tools, weapons and animal bones found at the prehistoric site of Solutré.
- Teenagers: The Rock of Solutré, 8 km west of Mâcon, was occupied by people for at least 55,000 years and gave its name to the Solutrean culture of the Upper Paleolithic. Digging at its foot began in 1866 on a large mass of horse bones.
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