The Vieux Port — the Old Harbour — is the heart of La Rochelle, an almost perfectly preserved medieval anchorage flanked by three fortified towers. The basin is small enough to walk around in twenty minutes and busy with fishing boats, dinghies, and the ferries to Île d'Aix. The two southern towers, Saint-Nicolas and the Tour de la Chaîne, mark the original harbour entrance; the slimmer Tour de la Lanterne sits a few hundred metres west on the seafront.
In summer the quays are crowded with cafés and restaurants. In autumn and winter the place empties out and you see it as the fishing port it has been for eight hundred years. The Grosse Horloge — the 14th-century clock tower at the head of the harbour — marks the gateway into the old town behind. Come at dawn for the best photos; come at dusk for an apéritif by the water.