Tournon was the first village on the Rhône where our ship docked.  It was in the Ardeche department, or section, of the Auvergne region.  After breakfast, our group met a local guide, Sophie, who made Tournon her home.  She conducted us through the oldest quarter of the town, where Renaissance houses as well as medieval dwellings and shops had been preserved.  As it was too early for the stores to be open, we in the tour group were almost the only people on the streets.

          On the way to the old city center, we paused at a handsome stone school set in a fenced park.  The Collège de Tournon was established in 1536.  It was still in use, unlike the two round towers visible on the hill above the town.  We had noticed the ruins of Tournon’s 16th Century fortifications on the previous evening, when we had taken a twilight walk after the ship docked. 

Collège de Tournon-sur-Rhône

         Once there had been sixteen towers on Tournon’s defensive wall.  Sophie led us on a path to the highest remaining tower.  The wind had strengthened after the rain, and it was driving the clouds from that stretch of the Rhône Valley.

One of Tournon's 16th Century defensive towers, with a statue of the Virgin Mary added in 1860.

          Though you might imagine that we were suffering from a surfeit of churches, the Eglise Saint-Julien had some unusual features to rekindle our interest.  Probably erected on the site of an ancient pagan temple, the Romanesque church was last rebuilt in the Gothic style of the 1300’s.  Its inner arches were wider and lower than  most Gothic ones.  As they supported less weight than their more pointed counterparts, the church had to be roofed with wood rather than stone.

Interior of the Church of Saint-Julien

The Old Town, Tournon

         Sophie had promised us a treat, and so took us to a chocolate maker’s shop in Tournon’s old city.  The proprietors were friends of hers, members of the younger generation of a family business.  They had also inherited the founder's passion for fine chocolate.  The founder was the present owner's father.  He had been a senior quality controller for the famous firm of Valrhona.  At some point, he decided to use his expertise to perfect new chocolate types on a much smaller scale.  It was not until we had left the village that I realized that the name Valrhona was derived from the Valley of the Rhône.

Sophie with Melchior, current head chocolatier of Las Llanas Chocolaterie
   

         Generally, I do not care for chocolate, but I tasted some samples that morning that justified Sophie’s praise.  The shop was named Las Llanas.  If ever you are in Tournon, I recommended that you go there.  And your arriving in that village is no more unlikely than my having been there, buying a bar of Blond Chocolate.