France
After a couple of days in the Spanish Basque Country I decided to cross the border to France. It was total of 3.5 hours driving from Bilbao to Biarritz but I had to take a few stops to surf in Zarautz, eat in San Sebastian and check out the Boardriders shop.
Biarritz
I made it to the Grand Tonic Hotel at night, the location was incredible, about 200 meters from the beach and walking distance to the center of the city. There is a restaurant right in front of the Sainte-Eugenie church, Le Tandem, a restaurant I have being going to since the first time I visited Biarritz, I love the moules-frites (mussels and fries)they serve there, of course I had to go there the first night of my trip. Another thing that I really like about this restaurant is the fact that they play live soccer games on their TVs. That’s the reason why I went 3 times to eat there during the same week.
The next morning I had breakfast at a coffee shop in front of the ocean. Then I went for a surf at La Grande Plage, it was suprisingly good for a summer session, usually the southwest of France gets some flat spells during this season that can only be broken by a storm.
Biarritz is a bit more on the luxurious side than Hossegor, but still has a fair amount of surf shops, including Rip Curl, Deus ex Machina, Picture and Last Age Concept, this last shop makes some very cool boardshorts with a creative Velcro closing mechanism. If you need sunscreen I definitely would suggest to go to the EQ Love shop.
Other stuff you can do here apart from surfing and eating is visiting the aquarium and Cite de l’Ocean a museum of the ocean, I’ve gone twice already, it’s not your typical museum, it is very interactive, activities like surfing simulator or a 4D parasailing simulator over the French Basque Country.
Hossegor
45 minutes away is Soorts-Hossegor, the “Surf City”, for those who have been to Huntington Beach, this city has better waves and shops that Huntington, the amount of shops and barrels you can get in the same day is unthinkable. Some surf spots I would recommend to surf 100% are La Graviere (the Quiksilver Pro France runs here), Les Culs Nus, Capbreton, La Santocha and if you are feeling adventurous drive up to Moliets-et-Ma. Moliets is famous for its surfcamps and is a long stretch of beach where you just have to search for a good sand bank and get surfed out with a minimum crowd.
There are many surf shops in the center of the city like Hurley, Quiksilver, Billabong, Globe and all the standard ones, but if you drive for a bit inland you’ll find an industrial village where you can find all the hidden gems: Euro Glass, Wasted Talent Boutique, Chipiron Surfboards, Burton, La Centrale, the biggest Carhartt shop I have ever seen and many more, the great thing about this place is that you can also find outlet shops from the big brands you saw in the city center.
