Fortress for sale on Le Bon Coin

FOR several months a cloth banner has hung on the walls of Fort Queyras as it dominates the route to the Italian border in Hautes-Alpes... saying “A vendre”. Now the search for a buyer has hit the internet and the fortress is on sale on Le Bon Coin.

Le Dauphiné Libéré spotted the advert for a “Château forteresse Delphinal du XIIIe siècle, fortifié par Vauban” that was up for sale on the website for €2.8million.

Covering 2,000m2, the 13th century castle at Chateau-Ville-Vieille is a Monument Historique and includes keep, towers and four drawbridges. But after being on sale for a year has still not drawn any takers – although the neighbouring commune of Aiguilles offered €1.8m to take it over.

The fortress has not been open to the public since September but drew 20,000 visitors a year for a site with spectacular views up and down the Guil valley.

However, it is not the most spectacular of the items for sale on leboncoin.fr ... with an Alpes-Maritimes villa up for sale for €9m. With 24 rooms, the villa has 127,000 m² of grounds – but, so far, no takers.

The site has also had some oddities, including an igloo – made from Mont Blanc snow – for sale in Sallanches, Haute-Savoie, for €12,345 in February; plus a donkey last November for €17.

Although there have been warnings of stolen goods being for sale, the site has 2.3m ads for clothing – and 3m visitors a year to its fashion section – plus 950,000 baby items, 700,000 pairs of shoes, 165,000 bikes, 110,000 musical instruments. That’s not to mention regular lots of horse dung or, once, a horse-drawn hearse, plus a concrete bunker in Normandy and Jacques Tati’s house in Vijon, Berry.