As one approaches Donzère the arid hills, whose fronts are broken up with strange valleys filled with detached masses and spires of rock, contract the valley to narrow dimensions. The town has kept its old walls and a machicolated gateway, which makes a pleasing picture when the wistaria on an adjoining house is in flower. In the town are the ruins of a château and the interesting church of the abbey, founded in 678. This early church was demolished by the Saracens, but the existing building goes back to the twelfth century.
The road climbs up among scrubby hills north of Donzère, and before dropping down to the river level again gives a magnificent view over the great valley, with a straight white ribbon going across the flat ground to the town of
MONTÉLIMAR
There are no remains of the Roman town of Acunum, and there is scarcely anything that is not quite modern in the streets. The chief relic of the Middle Ages is the château of the great family of Adhemar, now unfortunately converted into a prison. It contains considerable remains of a Romanesque chapel dedicated to St. Agatha. The Tour de Narbonne, standing on higher ground than the other buildings, was added in the fourteenth century as a second keep. Two gateways of the town ramparts, one of them rebuilt in recent times, and two good houses belong to the fifteenth or the following century.
The well-known almond ‘nougat’ of Montélimar is sold in several shops in the Grand Rue and elsewhere in the town.
North of Montélimar the road runs close to the banks of the Rhone, and then turns away slightly to Saulce, where there are mosaics and other remains of the Roman station of Batiana. A little to the left of the road is the old château of Freycinet, from which the well-known politician obtained his name.
After passing Loriol the road crosses the Drôme and goes through Livron, an interesting little town, with the ruins of its castle and remains of its fortifications, besieged in 1574-75 by the rigidly Catholic but excessively dissolute Henri III. The Protestants of Livron successfully held out during three assaults, and Henri retired ignominiously.
Just beyond Livron there is a bad cassis, and another occurs at the next village. The straightness of the road between Livron and Valence no doubt encourages scorching, and these shallow drains over the road, with their conspicuous warnings
