Côte d'Azur - Villages

In addition to the endless variety of coastal scenery, the capes and bays and hills, the picturesque towns and villages, the interesting little harbor towns and the old local capitals farther inland, the Côte d'Azur offers another attraction in the numerous villages perchés (hilltop villages) or nids d'aigle (eagles' eyries), built on inaccessible sites on hills, crags or ridges of rock in order to escape the attentions of foreign raiders or conquerors. The limited space available on these sites made it necessary to build houses of small surface area but considerable height, huddled closely together. Although these villages are increasingly being abandoned because of the difficulty of access and often the shortage of water, they are popular places of resort for artists and modern practitioners of the vie de bohème (bohemian life). Typical examples of these villages are Castellar, Gorbio, Roquebrune, Peillon, Eze, Vence, Tourette-sur-Loup and Gourdon.