La Lucarne aux Chouettes

La Lucarne aux Chouettes Review

Famed for decades as Leslie Caron's charmingly rustic riverside hotel and restaurant, "the Owl's Nest" has been sold by the actress but nevertheless draws almost as many people as ever to Villeneuve-sur-Yonne, thanks to its homey-meets-elegant feel on glorious show in four 17th-century buildings. The centerpiece is the Owl's Nest restaurant, which caresses the eye with its lovely whitewashed brick and ingenious twisted rope chandeliers. Guest rooms are also Maison et Jardin-ready: the "Loft" is an enormous wood-beam aerie atop the house (the bathroom is in the room itself, just as it was in the rip-roaring days of the 1680s), while "The Suite" glows with a portrait of Sarah Bernhardt. In summer enjoy the terrace over the Yonne. The town itself, a bastide (fortified town, built on a grid pattern), is entered and exited via sturdy, angular 13th- and 14th-century gateways. Breakfast is extra.