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BEAUNE , the principal town of the Côte d'Or, has managed to maintain its ancient air, despite rampant commercialism and a near constant stream of tourists. Narrow cobbled streets and sunny squares dotted with cafés make it a lovely spot to sample the region's wine, though you may find it cheaper and easier to use Dijon or the non-descript town of Chalon as a base for getting around in the area, as both are easily accessible by train and Transco buses, which service all the villages down the N74. Beaune is situated at a major autoroute junction (A6 from Paris/Lyon-A31 from Metz), and its hotels are pricey and likely to be full.

Beaune's town centre is a tightly clustered, rampart-enclosed vieille ville , and its chief attraction is the fifteenth-century hospital, the Hôtel-Dieu (daily: mid-April to mid-Nov 9am-6.30pm; rest of year 9-11.30am & 2-5.30pm; 32F/¬4.88), on the corner of place de la Halle. Once past the turnstile of the Hôtel-Dieu you find yourself in a cobbled courtyard surrounded by a wooden gallery overhung by a massive roof patterned with diamonds of gaudy tiles - green, burnt sienna, black and yellow - and similarly multi coloured steep-pitched dormers and turrets. Inside is a vast paved hall with a painted timber roof, the Grande Salle des Malades, which until quite recently continued to serve its original purpose of accommodating the sick. The last item on the tour is a splendid fifteenth-century altarpiece of the Last Judgement by Rogier van der Weyden, commissioned by Nicolas Rolin, who also founded the hospital in 1443 (King Louis XI commented: "It was only fair that a man who had made so many people poor during his life should create an asylum for them before his death"). A major wine auction takes place here during the annual Trois Glorieuses festival , the prices paid setting the pattern for the season.

The private residence of the dukes of Burgundy on rue d'Enfer now contains the Musée du Vin (daily 9.30am-6pm; winter closed Tues; 25F/¬3.81, same ticket allows entry to the two fine arts museums listed below), with giant winepresses and an interesting collection of tools of the trade. At the other end of rue d'Enfer is the collegiate church of Notre-Dame , which is about the only free thing in town (closed mid-Nov to March; guided visit 15F/¬2.28, otherwise free). Inside are five very special Tournai tapestries from the fifteenth century, depicting the life of the Virgin and commissioned, once again, by the Rolin family.

There are two other museums, both in the former Ursuline convent that is now the Hôtel de Ville: the not-very-interesting Musée des Beaux-Arts , and the Musée Marey Etienne-Jules , devoted to early movie photography (both April to mid-Nov daily 2-6pm; 25F/¬3.81, same entry ticket as for the wine museum). On the outskirts of the town, by the A6 Beaune-Tailly-Merceuil rest area, there's an open-air park called the Archéodrome , illustrating the history of Burgundy, with film and reconstructions of a Neolithic house, Cæsar's siege of Alésia , a farm with ancient breeds of farm animals and so on. It costs 20-50F/¬3.05-7.62 for adults, 15-40F/¬2.29-6.10 for kids, depending on how many of the displays you wish to see.