Will it be Ski or Spa in Cauterets?

Senior travelers find the Cauterets in the Hautes-Pyrenees (Midi-Pyrenees region) in the south-west of France, high in the Pyrenees, only 20 miles from the famous pilgrimage site of Lourdes. 

Cauterets has a reputation for healing powers in the form of its thermal hot springs. For centuries, the town’s therapeutic waters and natural beauty have drawn senior visitors. 

Victor Hugo  described the valley and its streams as “more than mere scenery. They are a glimpse of nature at certain mysterious moments when everything seems to dream.”

Cauterets is a well-established ski and spa resort in the heart of the Pyrenees and in a National Park.  Facing the Vignemale, the highest mountain in the area, the resort has been described as the “Chamonix of the Pyrenees”. Senior skiiers have direct access to 35km of downhill skiing, with 25 individual pistes, served by 21 ski lifts.

 Seniors Relax in Spas

Visitors can enjoy mountain biking, excursions, ice skating, swimming, tennis, bowling, mini golf, rafting, canyoning, fishing. Senior visitors can also enjoy the casino, cinema, theaters, guest house, national park house, library and media center.

This pleasant little town, population 1,200, owes its fame and elegant Neoclassical architecture to its waters, still in demand.

Senior visitors can get some mountain air and take a soothing dip at one of the town’s best-known spas, César Spa, after a day of hiking or skiing.

The Lac de Gaube, nearby, is a major attraction as well as the Pont D’Espagne, a really neat bridge that spans a stream high up in the air. For my wife and me, we might first head to the Boulangerie Patisserie Chez Gilou for some French pastries.

There are 14 hotels in town so you can compare what you would like and the price you want to pay. The spa brings in a throng of visitors today, but it was back in the sixteenth century that rendered famous the baths of Cauterets. During the Renaissance, Antiquity was in vogue.

Associated with the Roman civilization, the Pyrenean Baths were in fashion, thus placing Cauterets among the top resorts in the Pyrenees. Many works were undertaken between 1984 and 1999 to modernize and consolidate the baths at Cauterets, as a resort for two handicaps: otorhinolaryngological (that’s a long one!) and rheumatologic.

I think that you will have great fun in Cauterets. jeb