Our first full day in la Rochelle was spent exploring the historic part of the city, that part around the harbour. We went to the three main medieval towers, the Tower of St Nicholas, the Chain Tower and the Lantern Tower. Each had a different function in the protection of the harbour in days past. The Tower of St Nicholas was constructed in two stages in the 14th Century, the first developed a lean in the soft silt and had to be stabilised before the second was added. The structure is built around an amazing labyrinth of stone spiral staircases. One of these staircases is a "double helix", that is two staircases entwined so that two people could use it, one going up and the other down, and not cross paths. The second tower, the Chain
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