Other main towns: Chalon-sur-Saône, Le Creusot, Louhans
The tourist office for Saône-et-Loire prefers to call the department ‘Bourgogne du Sud’ (south Burgundy) because it says no one knows where Saône-et-Loire is but everyone knows Burgundy.
Other fanciful names for the department include ‘Lyon’s pantry’ – a reference to the famous foods associated with it, such as the huge, gentle Charolais cattle with their double rump muscles, or the poule de Bresse, which sells in Paris for €40 a bird.
The official name comes from two major rivers – the Saône, whose valley has been the main route from the north to the south for centuries, and the Loire, whose upper reaches skirt through the south-west corner of the department.
Wine connoisseurs know the department from two Burgundy classifications – Côte Chalonnaise and Mâconnais – as well as for Beaujolais.
Food and drink aside, the department has an industrial heritage based on coal mining, steel-making (with ore imported by inland waterway), brick and tile factories, and glass making.
Today the famous Creusot iron and steelworks still makes enormous parts for nuclear power stations and submarines.
Elsewhere, many of the frying pans made in France also come from this department.
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Saône-et-Loire has the A6 Autoroute du Soleil running through it north to south.
It is complemented by the east/west A79, while the N80 which links Montchanin with Châlon-sur-Saône is now a four-lane road with a central reservation, of motorway standard but without the tolls.
Lyon is the nearest international airport, with easyJet, British Airways and Wizz Air flights to the UK capital.
The TGV trains stop at both Le Creusot-Montceau and Mâcon-Loché stations.
Around 7% of the houses in the department are second homes.
The variety of the countryside, ranging from vineyards to cattle farms with bocage pastures, means there is no typical style for the department.
Properties in Saône et Loire
Surprisingly for such a dynamic department, there is a choice of properties below €50,000. At the time of writing, the following were available:
Under €50,000
This old farmhouse can be restoredCapifrance
This old farmhouse and barn is set in the rolling hills and pastures around the village of Dompierre-les-Ormes in Charolais cattle country and has an asking price of €42,000.
It looks as though it was left as it was when the previous peasant farmer turned the key in the door for the last time after disposing of all the furniture – so there is a lot of work to do.
The upside is you can restore it to your own taste, and the buildings look solid enough for you to live in while you do the work – although there might be a leak or two to encourage work on the roof first.
Currently the house has 40m2 of living space, divided between a kitchen and a bedroom, but openings could be created into the barns and stables next door.
A pocket handkerchief garden of 471m2 is fenced off around the buildings.
A house, a barn and just over half a hectare of ground with its own well and small pond are on sale in the commune of Saint-Christophe-en-Brionnais in the south-west of the department, with an asking price of €180,000.
The house has had some unfortunate grey rendering slapped over the walls – once removed it might reveal multi-coloured stonework as seen on the attached barn.
Currently the house has 161m2 of living space, with three bedrooms and two more ready to be converted, with the barn covering an extra 215m2.
The energy rating is the lowest, G, but changing the oil-fired central heating system would probably have an immediate beneficial effect on the certificate.
Described as a hôtel particulier but with two turrets to give it a chateau look, this property was converted into a 700m2 hotel 14 years ago. It is on the market in the commune of Céron for €1.8million, complete with an 18-hole golf course.
The conversion kept a magnificent wooden staircase leading to 12 double rooms, four of them with attached bathrooms, the others a salle d’eau.
Away from the house there is a restaurant with professional kitchen, bedrooms for staff, workshops for golf equipment and a 180m2 house suitable for an owner or manager if the property is kept as a business concern.
