Le Marais poitevin

West of Niort, north of La Rochelle, and south of Fontenay-le-Comte is an extensive area (approx. 400 mi²) of marshland or delta that has been drained and "tamed" over the centuries. It's the largest marsh along France's Atlantic coast, and the second largest area of marshland in the country after La Camargue, where the Rhône river flows into the Mediterranean. The main river flowing into the Marais poitevin is called la Sèvre niortaise. A network of man-made canals and islands have turned the marsh into a big park for hikers and boaters.

Don't get the idea that the Marais poitevin is a wilderness. It's been populated for thousands of years. In the Middle Ages, the village called Maillezais [my-uh-ZAY] became a Catholic bishopric and the abbey church above became a cathedral. The draining and improving of the marshland had started in about the year 1000. Today the village has a population of about one thousand. It's 30 minutes from Niort by car, and 45 or 50 minutes from La Rochelle. I grabbed the image above from a YouTube video about the place. I didn't take the picture myself.

The wars between French Catholics and Protestants in the 16th century were not kind to the towns and villages of the Marais poitevin. Neither was the French Revolution at the end of the 18th century. Not all the churches were reduced to ruins. Anyway, the ones that are in ruins are pretty picturesque.