If you have a taste for the bizarre, then there's one good reason for visiting Rochefort – the house of the novelist Julien Viaud (1850–1923), alias Pierre Loti. Forty years a naval officer, he wrote numerous bestselling romances with exotic oriental settings and characters. The Maison Pierre Loti, at 141 rue Pierre-Loti (guided tours: July to mid-Sept, daily every 30min from 10am; mid-Sept to June Mon & Wed–Sat, 10.30am, 11.30am, 2pm, 3pm & 4pm; closed Jan & public hols; €3.50–7.32; tel 05.46.99.16.88, reservations recommended), is part of a row of modestly proportioned grey-stone houses, outwardly a model of petit-bourgeois conformity and respectability, inside an outrageous and fantastical series of rooms decorated to exotic themes. There's a medieval banqueting hall complete with Gothic fireplace and Gobelin tapestries; a monastery refectory with windows pinched from a ruined abbey; a Damascus mosque; and a Turkish room, with kilim wall-hangings and a ceiling made from an Alhambra mould. To suit the mood of the place, Loti used to throw extravagant parties: a medieval banquet with swan's meat and hedgehog and a fête chinoise with the guests in costumes he had brought back from China, where he took part in the suppression of the Boxer rebellion.Also worth a quick look is the Centre International de la Mer (April–Sept 9am–7pm, Oct–March 10am–6pm; €4.57) situated in the Corderie Royale, or the royal ropeworks, off rue Toufaire. At 372m, the Corderie is the longest building in France and a rare and splendid example of seventeenth-century industrial architecture, substantially restored after damage in World War II. From 1660 until the Revolution, it furnished the entire French navy with rope, and the building now houses an appropriate exhibition on ropes and rope-making, including machinery from the nineteenth century. If you don't fancy visiting the museum, it's definitely worth a wander around the extensive building and its lawns along the River Charente, whose reed-fringed banks support a garden made up of plants brought back from long-forgotten expeditions overseas. One such, financed by Michel Bégon, quartermaster of Rochefort in 1688, brought back the flower we know as the begonia. The small harbour, the Bassin Laperouse, next to the Corderie, is also worth a stroll. If you're interested in finding out more about the town's history and naval importance, head for the Musée d'Art et d'Histoire, 63 av Charles-de-Gaulle (July & Aug daily 1.30–7pm; Sept–June Tues–Sat 1.30–5.30pm; €1.52), and the Musée de la Marine (daily except Tues 10am–noon & 2–6pm; closed mid-Oct to mid-Nov; €4.57), in the seventeenth-century Hôtel de Cheusses on place de la Gallossinnière, which houses an excellent collection of model ships, figureheads, navigational instruments and other naval paraphernalia. Fifteen minutes south is the Pont Transbordeur, France's only working tranpsorter bridge, built in 1900 – a technological wonder in its time. One other attractive small museum is the Musée des Métiers de Mercure at 12 rue Lessan, which displays lovingly and authentically reconstructed shop interiors from the beginning of the twentieth century (July & Aug daily 10am–8pm; Sept–June daily except Tues 10am–noon & 2–7pm; €4.57).
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