Marseille Layover Near Cours Julien
Part of the full Marseille Layover: Vieux-Port From MRS
Marseille’s Cours Julien is a pedestrian square of painted facades, café terraces and murals that get repainted every few months, sitting on a rise above the city centre with Place Jean-Jaurès and the ceramic front of Notre-Dame-du-Mont church a few minutes off it.
Cours Julien stopped being a fruit market in 1972
For roughly a century, from about 1860, this was where Marseille bought its fruit and vegetables wholesale and retail, and the square was the stomach of the city in the way Les Halles was for Paris. The market moved out in March 1972, the ground went pedestrian, and what filled the gap was cheap studio space: musicians, designers, and the painters who have been covering the surrounding walls ever since.
The square itself is a long pedestrian strip with a shallow water basin down the middle, plane trees and cypresses over the terraces, and a run of ochre and pink facades closing the north side. The murals are the reason to walk the side streets rather than sit the whole time: they turn over continually, so nothing you photograph here is guaranteed to be there next season. Markets take the square on a fixed rota, a growers’ and organic market on Wednesday mornings from 8am to 1pm under the pergolas, second-hand and antiquarian books on the second Saturday of the month, stamps on Sundays.
The Orange Vélodrome opens its dressing room to visitors
Olympique de Marseille’s ground is a short metro ride south of the square, and the club runs a tour of it that goes where a matchday ticket does not: the home dressing room, the tunnel the players walk out of, the press room, the panoramic lounge and the trophy room. It starts at Gate 18 on the Jean Bouin forecourt and takes about an hour.
Doors run 10am to 6pm, with last access an hour before closing, and tours do not run on match days, so a slot booked through a tours and activities platform before you travel saves arriving to a locked gate. It is the one ticketed thing within easy reach of this square; everything else here is free.
Place Jean-Jaurès, the square Marseille calls La Plaine
Five minutes north-east of Cours Julien, Place Jean-Jaurès is the largest square in central Marseille and goes by La Plaine to everyone who lives near it. The old surface, and the market that had run on it for generations, came to an end on 29 September 2018; what replaced it is a broad pale esplanade between two rows of plane trees, with the market back on it.
Traders set up Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday and Saturday from 7.30am to 1.30pm: fruit and vegetables on most of those days, flowers only on Wednesday. Both squares sit on a rise above Cours Lieutaud, and the staircase and climbing side streets that reach them are why a wheeled suitcase costs real minutes on this particular walk.
The ceramic Visitation over Notre-Dame-du-Mont’s door
A church has stood on Place Notre-Dame-du-Mont since 1586, sold off to a private buyer during the Revolution in 1791 and bought back by the city on 30 May 1821, which rebuilt it for a neighbourhood that had outgrown the old one. The neoclassical front you see now carries a high relief in coloured ceramic, made in Toulouse and set above the door in 1898, showing the Visitation.
Sailors who survived shipwrecks used to leave their offerings here, a habit that moved up the hill to the basilica of Notre-Dame de la Garde once that was built; the basilica and the harbour below it are what the main Marseille layover route covers instead. Entry costs nothing and the interior is dim and cool, which on a hot afternoon is most of the appeal.
The airport shuttle starts at Saint-Charles, fifteen minutes downhill
The 91 shuttle bus leaves from Saint-Charles station, about fifteen minutes on foot down from the square or a couple of stops on the metro, and covers the motorway to Marseille Provence Airport (MRS) nonstop in about 25 minutes, up to 50 when traffic is heavy. It goes every 10 minutes from 7am to 8pm, every 20 outside that, and costs 10 euros for an adult.
Downhill is the easy direction, which is worth remembering when you decide how long to sit on a terrace. The walk back to the station is a straight run down and takes less time than the climb up here did.
Frequently asked questions
What should I do during a layover near Cours Julien in Marseille?
Sit on the square first: Cours Julien is pedestrian, lined with terraces and repainted murals, and the walls change often enough that a lap of the surrounding streets is the point. Place Jean-Jaurès, five minutes north-east, is the largest square in the centre and holds a produce market on Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday and Saturday mornings. Notre-Dame-du-Mont church, a few minutes the other way, carries a coloured ceramic panel of the Visitation above its door. With longer, the Olympique de Marseille stadium tour is a short metro ride south and takes about an hour.
What is on at Cours Julien during the week?
A growers' and organic market fills the square on Wednesday mornings, 8am to 1pm, under the pergolas. Second-hand and antiquarian books take over on the second Saturday of each month, and a stamp market runs on Sundays. Nearby on Place Jean-Jaurès, the produce market runs Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday and Saturday from 7.30am to 1.30pm, with Wednesday given over to flowers. Any other morning, the square is terraces and shopfronts and nothing is set up.
Is Cours Julien step-free from the boulevard below?
Not by the direct route. The square sits on a rise above Cours Lieutaud and the shortest way up is a staircase, tagged and painted end to end. The streets on either side climb more gradually and get you to the same place without steps, at the cost of a few minutes. Everything on the square itself is flat once you are up.
Is the Orange Vélodrome worth a visit on a layover?
Budget three hours clear of your flight for it. The metro ride south takes a few minutes each way, the tour itself runs about an hour from Gate 18 on the Jean Bouin forecourt, and doors are 10am to 6pm with last access an hour before closing. Under three hours, the square and its side streets are the better use of the time, since nothing there needs a ticket or a fixed slot.
How far is Cours Julien from the Vieux-Port?
About fifteen minutes on foot, and downhill the whole way: the square sits on the rise behind Cours Lieutaud, and the streets off it drop towards the water. That closeness is the reason to treat the two as alternatives rather than a pair. If what you actually want is the harbour, the forts and the old lanes above them, the main Marseille route starts at the water and never comes up here.