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Follow the green line. And buy a City Pass. That's all you need to know if you don't want to go wrong in lovely Nantes (pronounced “nunt”).
But... Nantes? For most people, France means Paris. Those who are better at geography than most would know a bit about Lyon, Nice and Marseille—but Nantes is pretty much off the beaten track. But having just explored it, I can think of no earthly reason why we don't seem to know much about the place. After all, Nantes is the sixth largest city in France, with a fascinating history and stunningly beautiful museums, restaurants, gardens and greenery.
Nantes is a tourist-friendly city and most sights are accessible on foot. In fact, the city has painted a green line on the streets which connects all the sights together. All you have to do is follow it! A 24-hour pass will cost you EUR 27 and will give you access to many museums and institutions as well as all forms of public transport. It's well worth the investment. Museum buffs like me will be in seventh heaven as the range of museums includes those on the history of the region, art, natural history, printing presses, Jules Verne and more. (You can also opt for a 48-hour, 72-hour or one-week passes for EUR 37, 45 and 75, respectively.)
I purchased my pass online for one day on a Thursday morning and learnt that I would have to physically pick it up in a tourist office about a mile away. I reached the office (which had a green line leading to it, of course) and discovered that it opened at 10AM every day—except on Thursdays when it opened at 11AM. This was fortuitous, as I was to discover later.
Because the office was adjacent to the Château des ducs de Bretagne, I strolled over and crossed the drawbridge to see the grounds of the castle, which are open and free to the public. The Dukes of Brittany lived in the castle from the 13th to the 15th centuries. Later, having picked up my pass, I entered the spellbinding museum within the grounds, which traces the history of this lovely city, warts and all. The seafaring history of Nantes, the slave trade and how it fared during the two world wars is covered in 32 rooms which, like its corridors and staircases, are suffused in a low light. Now, a warning to those who, like me, lack knowledge of the French language: I rejected the offer of the audio guide when I entered the museum, as I thought it would be time-consuming to listen to it all. I then discovered that the plaques were all in French, leaving me to determine some of the finer details of the displays with my imagination.
A short distance away is the Museum of Art, or the Musée d'arts de Nantes. It has three floors of exquisite art and over 900 paintings and sculptures by famed artists like Renoir, Monet, Rodin, Rubens and Chagall. But for me, the standout show was of Pierrick Sorin, who had a uniquely inspired and maverick multimedia art exhibit. This was not surprising because I had already come across his work before in the last room of the Château des ducs de Bretagne. Incredibly, the menu in the museum café is curated by Eric Guerin, a Michelin-star chef. I had an entree of parfait d'asperge blanche, brioche toasté and praliné de sarassin grillé for EUR 9. Fine art coupled with an almost-Michelin-starred meal. Can things get better than that?
I next visited the Musée Dobrée, which had a long and winding queue of people waiting to enter it, so I decided to give it a miss. Even I had had enough of museums, or so I thought.
As it turned out, the next morning, I realised that my pass was valid up to 11AM, and the Musée Dobrée opened at 10AM, which meant I would able to see this one too. I’m glad I did, otherwise I would have missed a truly marvellous museum which was created by Thomas Dobrée, who began collecting art at the tender age of 21. He began with books and prints and then coins, continuing to collect them all his life. A year before he passed away (1895), in his will, he bequeathed his 15th-century mansion and the collection to the state. Soon, the Department of Archaeology threw themselves into the act, with the result that this magnificent museum came into being in 1899. With further additions over the years, the current collection includes material from the fields of archaeology, furniture, porcelain and much more from all the continents. One of the star attractions in the museum is the cardiotaph of Anne of Brittany. “What's that?” you are undoubtedly wondering. Well, it's a box which contains, or rather, contained, a heart! When Anne, Duchess of Brittany (and Queen of France) died in 1514, her heart was preserved in this precious and pretty golden receptacle. A rib-tickling video delineates the unusual history behind the equally unusual resting position of the heart, which has now decomposed of course, because the French did not employ Egyptian methods of mummification of organs.
One mustn’t forget that the history of Nantes is intertwined with the despicable age of slavery. Because man's inhumanity to man—something which still exists—must never be forgotten, the city has built a memorial to the abolition of slavery called the Memorial de l'abolition de d'esclavage. Built in 2012 in an underground passage along the banks of the river Loire, it consists of a 90-metre-long corridor with stark black text on white glass: quotes, statements and excerpts from literature, all related to the twin topics of freedom and slavery. Outside, 2,000 rectangular translucent glass plaques embedded in the ground display names of all the ships and destinations of the slave trade.
From time to time, you will lose sight of the green line. The solution is to locate it on the map that you are holding in your hands, figure out where you are and then retrace your steps to get back to the line. Following the green line not only results in you seeing the standard sights, but also unexpected ones. While passing by the garden of the University Hospital on the way to view a sculpture, I noted the bust of a man. Curious about the person's identity, I went closer and was chuffed to see that it was that of René Laennec. “Aah, who's that?” you may wonder. After all, Laennec is extremely well known in his field but probably not so outside his field. This is a pity because it was Laennec who, in 1816, invented the stethoscope, the instrument that has been associated with the medical profession since. And Laennec's connection with Nantes? He lived here as a youth and began his medical studies in the city.
There are so many more things to do and see in Nantes. Look specifically for the quirky shop signs when you are in the Feydeau, Place de Bouffay and Graslin regions of the city, all of which border each other. If you are a Harry Potter fan, you would want to visit the Passage Pommeraye, where you will find a shop selling merchandise for young wizards. Then there is the Jardin des Plantes, which is among the biggest gardens in France, and the famous Cathédrale Saint-Pierre-et-Saint-Paul, which is currently closed for repairs till January 2025 after a fire broke out in 2020.
In addition to all this, there's the Jules Verne Museum, which, as the name suggests, deals with the writer's life and inventions. Once again, the texts at the exhibits are almost entirely in French. A particularly well-known tourist sight is the Les Machines de l'Ile, which contains huge mechanical inventions of birds and animals, such those of a heron, spider, chameleon and others. The staff explained the working of the machines, but I seemed to have landed up during the French session. In the immediate vicinity of this hall is the mascot of Nantes: a wooden elephant 12 metres high, eight metres wide and 21 metres long. This mechanical monster carries up to 50 people at a time and takes them for half-hour-long trips. These engineering marvels were undoubtedly impressive, but perhaps it was towards the end of a long day, or perhaps I am not enamoured by technology as much as history, or perhaps it was the language issue—at any rate, I did not find this a must-do. The gallery of the workshop where the elephant was first built in 2007 has its history displayed on the wall, as well as a film on the subject. There is also a new mascot which is currently being built—but signs all over request that visitors not take any photographs, so that it can be a surprise when it is finally launched. Hence, I did not take a photo, nor shall I tell you more about the new mascot.
And with that, my trip to Nantes was over.
There are direct flights to Paris from Bengaluru, Mumbai and New Delhi. From Charles de Gaulle Airport (CDG), you can take a cab or a train to the Gare de Lyon and then one of the many trains (like the TGV) to Nantes.
