| Once you're in the old town, getting around is simple, and some of the most interesting things to see are outdoors and free – such as the beautiful bluish stone walls of most buildings, and the signs of Roman life that still remain. Rue de la République leads from the river to the central place du 8-Septembre and the sixteenth-century Hôtel de Ville. The principal street, Grande-Rue, cuts across the square along the line of an old Roman road. At its northwestern end – the livelier part of town with shops and cafés – is the place de la Révolution and the excellent Musée des Beaux-Arts (daily except Tues 9.30am–noon & 2–6pm; €3.20), with some good nineteenth- and twentieth-century works, two magnificent Bonnards and a wonderful clock collection. Midway down Grande-Rue, the fine sixteenth-century Palais Granvelle (Wed–Sun 1–7pm; €3, free Sat) contains an interactive museum paying homage to the town's history of clock-making, the Musée du Temps. Continuing up the street, you pass place Victor-Hugo (he was born at no. 140) and arrive at the Porte Noire, a second-century Roman triumphal arch spanning the street and partially embedded in the adjoining houses. Beside it, in the shady little square Archéologique A.-Castan, are the remains of a nymphaeum, a small reservoir of water fed by an aqueduct. Beyond the arch is the pompous eighteenth-century Cathédrale St-Jean (closed Tues) which houses the nineteenth-century Horloge Astronomique (hourly guided visits in French: April–Sept daily except Tues 9.50–11.50am & 2.50–5.50pm; rest of year Mon & Thurs–Sun same hours; closed Jan; €2.30), detailing over a hundred terrestrial and celestial positions and containing some 30,000 parts. The spectacular Citadelle (daily: July & Aug 9am–7pm; April–June and Sept to mid-Nov 9am–6pm; rest of year 10am–5pm; €6.10) is a steep fifteen-minute climb from the cathedral, and has a crow's-nest view of the town and the noose-like bend in the river that contains it. It houses many worthwhile museums (times as above): for animal lovers there's the Musée d'Histoire Naturelle (with aquarium, insectarium and zoo); the Musée Comtois, with pottery, furniture and a good collection of nineteenth-century marionettes, as well as some marvellous old farming implements; the Espace Vauban, devoted to the military architect; and – best of all – the Musée de la Résistance et de la Déportation, a superb aid to understanding postwar France's political consciousness (English audio commentary available). The first rooms document the rise of Nazism and French Fascism through photographs and exhibits, including a bar of soap stamped RIF – "Pure Jew Fat". In the section on the Vichy government, there's a telegram of encouragement sent by Marshal Pétain to the French troops of the "legion of volunteers against Bolshevism", who were fighting alongside the Germans on the eastern front. Finally, as counterbalance, much is made of General Leclerc's vow at Koufra in the Libyan desert, whose capture in January 1941 was the first, entirely French, victory of the war – "We will not stop until the French flag flies once more over Metz and Strasbourg" – a vow which he kept when he entered the latter city at the head of a division in November 1944.
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