Photo : Pline / Wikimedia Commons (CC BY-SA 3.0)
La Flotte
La Flotte, or La Flotte-en-Ré, is a village on the Île de Ré, in the Charente-Maritime, ranked among the Most Beautiful Villages of France. It is the largest commune on the island and the second by population, after Sainte-Marie-de-Ré. It has belonged since 2011 to the "Villages de pierres et d'eau" network.
A fishing community since Antiquity, the village developed in the eleventh century around the castle of the Mauléon family. From the medieval market, lanes lead to the church of Sainte-Catherine, from the fourteenth century, remodelled up to the eighteenth. Of the abbey of Les Châteliers, built in 1156, only the side walls of the church and part of the cloister remain. The port, white lanes and hollyhocks make the charm of the walk.
