Beauvais, France Hotels, Vacations, Tourism

As you head south from Amiens towards Paris, the countryside becomes broad and flat – agricultural, though not rustic. BEAUVAIS , 60km south of Amiens, seems to fit into this landscape. Rebuilt, like Amiens, after the last world war, it's a drab, neutral place redeemed only by its radiating Gothic cathedral, the Cathédrale St-Pierre , which rises above the town, its roof, unadorned by tower or spire, seeming squat for all its height. It's a building that perhaps more than any other in northern France demonstrates the religious materialism of the Middle Ages – its main intention to be … more »