Millau is a very pleasant, lively provincial town whose clean and well-preserved old streets have a summery, southern charm. It owes its original prosperity to its position on the ford where the Roman road from Languedoc to the north crossed the Tarn, marked today by the truncated remains of a medieval bridge surmounted by a watermill jutting out into the river beside the modern bridge.Whether you arrive from north or south, you'll find yourself sooner or later in place du Mandarous, the main square, where avenue de la République, the road to Rodez, begins. South of here, the old town is built a little way back from the river to avoid floods and contained within an almost circular ring of shady boulevards. The rue Droite cuts through the centre, linking the three squares: place Emma-Calvé, place des Halles and place Foch. The prettiest by far is place Foch, with its cafés, shaded by two big plane trees and bordered by houses supported on stone pillars; some are as old as the twelfth century. In one corner, the church of Notre-Dame is worth a look for its octagonal Toulouse-style belfry, originally Romanesque. In the other, there's the very interesting Musée de Millau (April–Sept daily 10am–noon & 2–6pm; Oct–March closed Sun; €4), housed in a stately eighteenth-century mansion. Its collections revolve around the bizarre combination of archeology and gloves, and include the magnificent red pottery of the Graufesenque works, as well as a complete 180-million-year-old plesiosaurus. Millau's other two squares have been the subject of some rather questionable attempts at reconciling old stones and Richard Rogers-inspired contemporary urban design. Off one of these squares, place Emma-Calvé, the clock tower (June & Sept Mon–Sat 10–11.30am & 3–5.30pm; July & Aug daily 10am–noon & 3.30–6pm; €2.29) is worth a climb for the great all-round view. Take a look also in the streets off the square – rue du Voultre, rue de la Peyrollerie and their tributaries – for a sense of the old working-class and bourgeois districts. Clear evidence of the town's importance in Roman times is to be seen in the Graufesenque pottery works, just upstream on the south bank (daily 9am–noon & 2–6.30pm; €4), whose renowned red terracotta ware (terra sigillata) was distributed throughout the Roman world. It was a huge production line in its day, involving four hundred potters and a hundred kilns; today, there's an archeology museum with a permanent exhibition of the bowls, vases and cups that were produced.
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