Located in Southern France, Marseille is the second-most populous city in France, after Paris. It has a slightly negative reputation because of some of its history and crime stats. While it is a little rough around the edges, Nik and I had a great time visiting Marseille. Easy to get around, tons of history, old and new architecture and in our case, the excitement of seeing a Bruce Springsteen concert.
Getting to Marseille
The Springsteen concert was originally scheduled for a date in May 2024 but had been postponed and rescheduled for May 31, 2025. Now that we are living in Nice, with Marseille a train ride away, I really wanted to see this concert. About a month before it, Nik and I decided to make the trip to Marseille happen. After booking a dog sitter through TrustedHousesitters and buying concert tickets on StubHub, we booked a roundtrip train ride from the Nice-Ville Train station.
We had reserved (assigned) seats on the train and it even had decent WiFi, though the train was a bit stuffy because of how sunny it was outside. The nearly two and half hour train ride passed relatively quickly and we arrived to an equally hot and sunny Marseille.
For those reasons we ordered an Uber to take us to our hotel in the La Joliette neighborhood near the newer Grand Port where the big cruise ships dock. It was slim pickings for hotel options and this one ended up being pretty meh.
Related: Springsteen in Marseille Recap
Sightseeing in Marseille
As we started walking around the city, you can just see the history and gorgeous architecture everywhere.
The most visited monument in Marseille is Notre-Dame de la Garde, a Grand basilica located at the city’s highest point. It was on our list of places to see, but we didn’t make it there. We just admired it from different vantages around the city.
Cathédrale La Major
Closer to where we stayed is Cathédrale La Major, or Marseille Cathedral. To me, it’s as beautiful from the outside as Notre-Dame de la Garde is and easier to get to.
The foundation stone was laid by Emperor Napoleon III in 1852, and the first service was held in 1893. It was completed in 1896.
Related: That time we stayed in Napoleon III’s former palace
The exterior facade reminds me a lot of the style of the Dohány Street Synagogue in Budapest:
Entry to Cathédrale La Major is free so we decided to go an in and walk around. Absolutely beautiful.
Fort Saint-Jean
Not far from Marseille Cathedral is the entryway to the old Port of Marseille. Louis XIV (the Sun King) built two forts across from each other around 1660: Fort Saint-Jean and Fort Saint-Nicolas. This was his way to assert his authority over the city and show a response to a local uprising against the governor.
Even though it was an incredibly hot day as we walked around, Nik and I decided to check out Fort Saint-Jean since it was right there.
You walk across a modern footbridge to enter the fort, pass through a quick bag check and then you’re free to explore the grounds. The fort grounds are massive and my pictures don’t do it justice. There were officer quarters, an area they called a village and more.
Throughout the 19th and early 20th centuries, Fort Saint-Jean was in the possession of the French Army. During World War II, Fort Saint-Jean was occupied by the German military in November 1942. In August 1944, during the liberation of Marseilles, the explosion of a munitions depot within the fort destroyed much of its historic battlements and buildings.
Classified as a historical monument in 1964, the damaged portions of the fort were reconstructed between 1967 and 1971.
It was sunny and hot, so Nik and I kept moving and taking in the views while admiring the massive scale of the fort.
Memorial of the Deportations
At the bottom of Saint-Jean Fort is the Memorial of Deportations located in a blockhouse, also known as an above-ground cement bunker, built by the German army.
Originally built to prevent an Allied landing in the area, the museum now tells the story of men, women and children arrested and deported during World War II because they were born Jewish or repressed as politicians, resistance fighters, hostages or “suspects” in Marseille.
The exhibition deals with tragic events of 1943 known as the Marseille roundup. Between January 22 and 24, 1943 under the Vichy regime during the German occupation of France and assisted by the French police, 2,000 Jews were first sent to Fréjus, then to the camp of Royallieu near Compiègne, in the Northern Zone of France, and then to Drancy internment camp, the last stop before the extermination camps.
The operation was also intended to reshape the area of the Old Port. After the population was evacuated to the concentration camps, police searched house by house before ultimately destroying the buildings with dynamite.
The Hôtel de Ville (city hall) was one of only four buildings to survive after the Germans demolished most of the surrounding area.
Église Saint-Laurent Church
In the same vicinity as the Memorial of the Deportations and Fort Saint Jean is Église Saint-Laurent Church.
Its history dates back centuries and during World War II, the Church was partly spared from the bombardments, unlike the rest of the Old Port district. It faced significant damage and reconstruction work was conducted gradually and was completed recently.
On the side is a plaque in tribute to Abbé Félix Caillol, parish priest of the church. He did not leave his church and sounded the bell during the evacuation and Marseille roundup in Jan. 1943.
United States Consulate in Marseille
We randomly ended up passing the United States Consulate in Marseille and noticing two plaques located out front.
One is for American journalist Varian Fry. Fry ran a rescue network in Vichy France from August 1940 to September 1941 that helped 2,000 anti-Nazi and Jewish refugees, mostly artists and intellectuals, escape from persecution by Nazi Germany during World War II. Among those he helped include artists Marc Chagall and Max Ernst.
Fry was the first of five Americans to be recognized as “Righteous Among the Nations“, an honor given by the State of Israel to non-Jews who saved the lives of many Jews and anti-Nazi refugees during World War II.
The second plaque is for Vladimír Vochoč, a lawyer and diplomat who served as Czechoslovakian Consul in Marseilles from 1938 to 1941. Vochoč worked with Fry to provide Czechoslovak passports.
Returning to Czechoslovakia in 1948, Vochoč was convicted of treason in a rigged trial and spent nearly seven years in prison. He died in anonymity and in 2016 was awarded the title of “Righteous Among the Nations”.
I was really quite surprised by the depth of destruction and deportations Marseille experienced during World War II. Visiting these sites and memorials was really fascinating and quite moving.
Dining Out in Marseille
Nik and I really only had two nights in Marseille for dining out, since one night was the Bruce concert. That said we had two very good dinners and checked out a few Irish Bars around the port and a couple spots in La Plaine, a historic square also known as Place Jean-Jaurès.
Dinner at Haïku Ramen
Somehow Nik found Haïku Ramen, a Japanese restaurant for one of our dinners. I think we liked the idea of something different than French food.
Since it was pretty hot, temperature-wise around Marseille, we skipped the ramen entrees, though they looked good, and enjoyed pork gyoza, fried chicken and grilled marinated pork. All were delicious as were the cocktails we had too.
Dinner at Ciel Rooftop
Another delicious dinner was at Ciel Rooftop which we learned about from the Me and Mon Ami YouTube Channel.
Ciel (French for sky) is a rooftop restaurant in one of the tallest buildings of Marseille, the old Galeries Lafayette. The building is now home to The Babel Community with “turnkey co-living apartments to flexible coworking workspaces.”
Ther rooftop offered amazing views in every direction of the city, especially towards Notre-Dame de la Garde.
Our drinks and food were delicious! We had a couple fruity cocktails, a veal meatball starter, gnocchi in a red sauce with stracciatella for Nik’s entree while I had the fusilli pasta with pesto and burrata.
Other Spots Around the City
Down by the port, we enjoyed cold beers at Lochness and some Guiness and Bruce sing-alongs at O’Malleys. We also enjoyed a nice variety of beers at Les Berthom in the pedestrian square of Cours Honoré-d’Estienne-d’Orves.
One side of the port has a stretch of cafes facing the water. They all looked about the same, offering salads, mussels and things of the sort and we had an underwhelming fried seafood platter at one of them.
We also found some decent smash burgers at Holymelt Burger & Coffee near Cathédrale La Major.
During our last evening in Marseille, we walked up to the area known as La Plaine. It’s a large square framed by dive bars and restaurants. We had drinks at La Brasserie Communale and Videodrome 2. The latter has a cinema space in addition to their bar and pop-up food offerings.
That about wraps up our three night stay visiting Marseille. We ate well, saw a phenomenal concert, explored some historic sites and learned more about the city. I feel like there is much more to see and do, so perhaps we’ll make a return visit.
