Entente Cordiale

Sharing my life between France and the UK. I have a particular affinity with this monument in the village. It commemorates the Franco British Entente Cordiale of 1904. I have blipped the monument before but this is a detail. The impressive monument is found in this Pyrenean village by virtue of the fact that Vernet les Bains was a popular spa destination for rich Edwardian Britons including Rudyard Kipling and Princess Beatrice. These two also contributed to the building of the village Anglican church, one of the few in France. The posh hotels were mostly swept away in the great aiguat or flood of 1940. The village has a few vestiges of its past glory but now it is a sleepy place, busy only in the summer months with walkers and lovers of nature. The thermal spa still attracts curistes who come for the alleviation of their rheumatic complaints or for more generalised bien-être. These spa treatments are considered efficacious and are available on the French health service.