Ville Close

The Ville Close is a small walled island connected to the mainland by two short bridges, its granite ramparts rising directly from the harbour water. The walls run for about 400 metres around the island and are mostly intact; you can walk the full circuit on the wall walkway, which gives excellent views over the fishing harbour and the bay. The entrance gate and bridge, the most photographed part of town, faces the main quay where the fishing boats tie up.

Inside the walls, the island is about 350 metres long and quite narrow — essentially two streets with lanes connecting them. The buildings are 17th and 18th century for the most part, the ground floors now occupied by restaurants, crêperies, and the inevitable souvenir shops. The Musée de la Pêche, just inside the main gate, is one of the best maritime museums in Brittany, covering the history of cod fishing in the North Atlantic, the sardine canning industry that once employed most of the town, and the tuna fishing that replaced it.

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The Ville Close was fortified and refined over several centuries, with major work by Vauban in the late 17th century — though the core walls date from the 14th century, when the town was a major stronghold during the Hundred Years' War. The island was besieged numerous times, most notably in 1342 when it held out for months against the English. Today the same fortifications that resisted medieval sieges are regularly overwhelmed by day-trippers; the island's permanent population is a handful of residents in a place that once held hundreds.