Photo : Florent Pécassou / Wikimedia Commons (CC BY-SA 3.0)
Auch
The former capital of the county of Armagnac and then of the province of Gascony, Auch dominates the Gers valley from a plateau linked to the river by a monumental stairway of more than two hundred steps, built in the 19th century and adorned with a statue of the musketeer d'Artagnan.
The Cathedral of Sainte-Marie, a vast Flamboyant Gothic building with a classical façade, has Renaissance stained glass and carved wooden choir stalls among the richest in France, while the nearby Tour d'Armagnac, a former episcopal prison, completes the monumental ensemble. The narrow lanes of the old town, locally called 'pousterles', run down in steps towards the river through a preserved medieval maze, making Auch a gateway to the fortified villages and Armagnac vineyards around it.
