Photo : Père Igor / Wikimedia Commons (CC BY-SA 3.0)
Grotte de Bétharram
The Bétharram caves are about 11 kilometres west of Lourdes, on the border of the Pyrénées-Atlantiques and the Hautes-Pyrénées. Discovered in 1810, they are among the first caves opened to the public in France. They form a tiered karst system, made up of two linked networks, Bétharram and Mélat; the latter was discovered in 1971 by a group of speleologists.
The Bétharram network has about 7,100 metres of known galleries, for an estimated total length of 8,250 metres. The visit follows a route of about 2.8 kilometres over three levels of galleries carved by underground water. It begins in the upper part, the largest, with its great halls, crosses an old riverbed, then ends with a boat trip on the current watercourse. The return is through a tunnel of 400 metres.
In 2018, the site ranked fourth among Nouvelle-Aquitaine's natural attractions by attendance, with some 150,000 visitors a year.
