Chateauneuf-en-Auxois

Chateauneuf stands on a limestone outcrop about five hundred metres up, looking down on the Burgundy canal and the Auxois plain, and it was built to watch the road between Dijon and Autun. The castle is a compact fortress of round towers and a moat, begun in the twelfth century and given a comfortable late Gothic lodging in the fifteenth by Philippe Pot, a Burgundian courtier whose famous tomb with hooded mourners is now in the Louvre. The last private owner gave it to the state in 1936. The village around it is a single lane of stone houses with mullioned windows built by merchants who served the castle.

What you actually see

• The fortress - round towers and moat above the Auxois plain.
• The late Gothic lodging - the fifteenth-century residential wing.
• The merchant houses - mullioned stone facades along one lane.
• The canal view - the Burgundy canal winding below the rock.

When to go

April to October; the castle closes some winter periods and on certain weekdays. The village is small and quiet, busier on summer weekends. The canal towpath below suits cycling.

Honest expectations

The castle interior is largely bare stone rooms rather than furnished. The village is a few hundred metres end to end. Parking is outside the walls and limited in season.

Nearby

Dijon lies east; Semur-en-Auxois is northwest.