Pyrenees Guide

Bagneres-de-Luchon, also referred to as Luchon, is a spa town and a commune in the Haute-Garonne département, in southwestern France.

Bagneres-de-Luchon is located 87 m. S.S.W. of Toulouse, at the end of a branch line of the Southern railway from Montréjeau. The town is situated at the foot of the central Pyrenees in a beautiful valley at the confluence of the One and the Pique.

Bagnères-de-Luchon is celebrated for its thermal springs. The springs, which number forty eight, vary in composition, but are chiefly impregnated with sodium sulfate, and range in temperature from 62 to 150 Fahrenheit.

The discovery of numerous Roman remains attests the antiquity of the baths, which are identified with the Onesiorum Thermae of Strabo. Their revival in modern times dates from the latter half of the 18th century, and was due to Antoine Mégret d'Etigny, intendant of Auch.

Within the town today a more modern entrance to the baths sits alongside the older buildings. The bathing experience consists of repeated spells within a hot, sulphurous atmosphere in caves that run approximately 100 metres inside the Superbagnères mountain, and in a cool swimming pool within the entrance building. It was these sulphur springs that led to a twinning of the settlement with Harrogate in 1952.