Forty kilometres southwest of Rodez and 6.5km northwest of Naucelle, SAUVETERRE-DE-ROUERGUE makes the most rewarding side trip in this part of the Rouergue. It is a perfect, otherworldly bastide, founded in 1281, with a large, wide central square, part cobbled, part gravelled, and surrounded by stone and half-timbered houses built over arcaded ground floors. Narrow streets lead off to the outer road, lined with stone-built houses the colour of rusty iron. On summer evenings, pétanque players come out to roll their bowls beneath chestnut and plane trees, while swallows and swifts swoop and dive overhead.In summer, a bus runs once a weekday here in the late afternoon from Rodez. The tourist office is in the main square (June–Sept Mon 2.30–6pm, Tues–Fri 10am–12.30pm & 2.30–6pm, Sat 10am–12.30pm; tel 05.65.72.02.52). There are several agreeable hotels, including the cheap and charming Hôtel La Grappe d'Or, on the outer road (tel 05.65.72.00.62; under €30), whose restaurant (closed Oct–April) offers an excellent menu at €13, with dishes like gésiers chauds, tripoux, cheese, ice cream and fouace (a kind of sweet cake). More upmarket is the Sénéchal, at the entrance to the village (tel 05.65.71.29.00, www.senechal.net; €85–100; closed Jan to late-Mar), with an indoor pool and an excellent restaurant (closed Mon plus Tues lunch; from €25). There's also a campsite, just off the D997 (tel 05.65.47.05.32). The country round about, known as the Ségala, is high (around 500m) and wide, cut by sudden and deep river valleys full of lush greenery. The most spectacular of these is the valley of the River Viaur to the south and west of Sauveterre, where a car is essential. If you're heading west towards Najac, there's a marvellous back-country route through La Salvetat, crossing the Viaur at Bellecombe and again at Moulin-de-Bar, where there's a riverside campsite, Le Gomvassou. The wartime Resistance was very active hereabouts and there are numerous memorials to the Resistance fighters who lost their lives in the aftermath of the D-day landings. There is a particularly interesting one beside the tiny church in Jouqueviel, further downstream, dedicated to a unit of Polish volunteers and 161 escaped Soviet POWs.
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