Why should I go? Three reasons. First, it’s where
well-heeled, well-born and cultivated Britons like you and me used to spend
winter weeks. The style remains and the glamour is coming back. It’s time to
return.
Second, the coast has a glorious complementary wildness, rocky and rolling
with rollers. The briny surges up great beaches and around cliffs and creeks
in an angry lather, tossing surfers about in satisfactory manner.
And third, this is Basque country — bloody-minded, of course, but you’re never
far from a fête, a feast or the flashing of balls, whether rugby or pelota.
It is, in short, a hell of a mix.
Napoléon III and Empress Eugénie put the initial oomph into Biarritz when they
built a holiday palace on a headland in 1854. The place suddenly became
party central, drawing the great, the good and idle loafers from across
Europe. Napoléon’s reign burnt out in 1870, the palace shortly afterwards —
only to be rebuilt on an even grander scale as the Hôtel du Palais.
And the party continued. Our Edward VII was a winter regular. The Duke of
Windsor and Frank Sinatra, too. Deborah Kerr’s husband, Peter Viertel, took
a plank out to sea, and so introduced surfing to Europe.
Life slowed down in the 1950s and 1960s, but is speeding up again now.
Brighter Parisians prefer it to the Riviera. Alain Prost and Karl Lagerfeld
have houses in town. But the background, thank heavens, remains Basque, with
its taste for berets, boisterousness in bars and putting the rest of the
world right about rugby. If you want to dispute this, try the Red Café, on
Avenue Foch.
Where should I stay? The Hôtel du Palais (1 Avenue de
l’Impératrice; 00 33-5 59 41 64 00, www.hotel-du-palais.com; doubles from
£265) dominates town, coast and tradition. Glide in through the wrought-iron
gates, past the gardens, up to the vast ochre-red and stone edifice, and
into a lobby of imperial presumption. At once, you are co-opted into the
continuum of grand living. If you’ve got the money (and there are slightly
cheaper deals on the website), you really have no choice.
But if that looks a bit steep, then the Tonic Hotel (58 Avenue Edouard VII; 05
59 24 58 58, www.biarritz-hotels.com; doubles from £104) is dead central and
has recently been done up in a chic design style that would raise no
eyebrows in London, but is almost subversive in Biarritz.
Where should I eat? Sorry to sound obsessive, but best in
town is the Hôtel du Palais’ Rotonde restaurant (£40 steeply upwards). Its
cut-glass class makes commoners feel like crowned heads and crowned heads
feel at ease. Huge windows bring you the pounding sea in Sensurround. Tackle
the coquilles St-Jacques, venison and a grand cru Bordeaux, and you’ll
barely notice the tenners slipping elegantly out of your life.
More reasonable is Chez Philippe (30 Avenue du Lac Marion; 05 59 23 13 12;
from £30). It’s contemporary and intimate, but its real plus is the big
fire, on which much of the cooking is done.
For excellent fish, try the lively Chez Albert (Port des Pêcheurs; 05 59 24 43
84; from £26), which backs into the wooded slope overlooking the old fishing
port.
What should I do? A Biarritz day starts at the market hall on
Rue des Halles. Wandering past peppers and hams, sheep’s cheese and tubs of
axoa veal stew, you end up Chez Etienne. Old Etienne runs the market cafe
counter, where local lad and superstar chef Alain Ducasse pops along for his
7am omelette when he’s in town.
Then you stroll the coast from the Grande Plage, up and round the
promontories, by feathery tamarisk trees and along walkways out to tiny
islands. On the Rocher de la Vierge, the emblematic Virgin looks at once
serene and terribly vulnerable. The sea leaps at her like a pack of hounds.
If you fancy surfing, locals favour the Plage des Basques and the vast
stretches of beach running south from there. Meanwhile, Golf du Phare,
minutes from the town centre, is the second-oldest golf course in mainland
Europe. A pass for it and four courses nearby costs £157 (05 59 03 71 80,
www.touradour.com/golfpass.htm).
Big-name shops cluster around Avenue Edouard VII, and the best museum is the
Asiatica show of oriental art (Rue Guy Petit; £5).
Then you’ll need a break and a rub-down at Spa Kémana (3 Carrefour Hélianthe;
05 59 22 12 13, www.kemana.fr). It’s owned by the French international
flanker Serge Betsen and has treatments I’d never heard of before. “Zénitude
is the aim,” says Serge — unusually, perhaps, for a rugby player.
It is admirable preparation for festivities, at which Basques excel. Try
kicking off at surfer bars such as Le Surfing, on the Côte des Basques, or
Le Milk, by the Grande Plage. Then carry on until it’s time, once again, for
that 7am omelette.
Getting there: Ryanair (www.ryanair.com) flies to Biarritz
from Stansted, Dublin and Shannon. The shuttle bus to the centre of town
costs 90p, a day-time taxi £6.50.
