Lourdes entdecken

The Château fort de Lourdes is a medieval fortress on a rocky outcrop in the centre of Lourdes, guarding the entrance to the Lavedan valleys. Once the seat of the counts of Bigorre and later a royal and state prison, it has housed the Musée pyrénéen since 1921, with collections on Pyrenean life and mountaineering and a botanical garden.

The Sanctuary of Our Lady of Lourdes is a Catholic pilgrimage site of 52 hectares around the grotto of Massabielle, where Bernadette Soubirous reported 18 apparitions of the Virgin Mary in 1858. It includes three basilicas, the grotto with its spring, baths, a large esplanade used for processions and a Stations of the Cross on the hillside.

The Rosary Basilica is the lower of the three basilicas of the Sanctuary of Our Lady of Lourdes, built in a Romano-Byzantine style to plans by Léopold Hardy from 1883 and consecrated in 1901. Its round nave under a dome is ringed by 15 side chapels with mosaics of the Mysteries of the Rosary, and two curving ramps lead up to the Upper Basilica.

The Pic du Jer funicular has run from the southern edge of Lourdes to the summit of the Pic du Jer since 1900. The 1,100-metre line, with two tunnels and several viaducts, climbs about 480 metres in around ten minutes. At the top are a viewpoint over Lourdes and the Pyrenees, walking trails, mountain-bike tracks and caves visited on guided tours.