 Old wooden houses line the Loue River, in the village of Ornans |
When the sculptor Frederic Bartholdi spent four years crafting a giant sandstone lion towering over the city of Belfort, in the French region of Franche-Comté, little did he realise that ten years later he would become world-famous as the creator of the Statue of Liberty. But Franche-Comté (meaning “Land of the Free”) somehow seems to have fallen off the map. As far as Lonely Planet is concerned, the region doesn’t even exist. Even the region’s two biggest cities – Besançon (birthplace of Victor Hugo of Les Misérables fame) and Dôle (birthplace of Louis Pasteur) don’t rate a mention. The result is that tourists in Franche-Comté are conspicuous by their total absence – which makes a visit even more a journey of exploration
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