Royan Hotels

Royan is a commune in the Charente-Maritime departement, in south- western France. Inhabitants are called royannais and royannaises in french. An important seaside resort with an international reputation, Royan is a city of 18,100 inhabitants in the heart of an urban area estimated at 38,638 inhabitants, which makes it the fourth largest conurbation in the département after La Rochelle, Rochefort and Saintes. Capital of the Cote de beaute , the city is located in the mouth of the Gironde Estuary, the largest estuary in Europe. Royan has five sandy beaches, a marina and a fishing port. Famous from the nineteenth century for its « Bains de mer » (sea swimming), this very rich resort welcomed numerous artists during the roaring twenties. Ravaged by terrible bombardments in 1945, the city was declared a research laboratory on town planning and since then has an architectural heritage dating from the 1950s (modernistic architecture). The city's post-war revival allows it today to welcome up to 90,000 inhabitants at the height of the season. Royan is a famous seaside resort situated in the southwest of the department of Charente-Maritime, in the former province of Saintonge. It occupies a site on the mouth of the Gironde Estuary, on the right, near the Atlantic coast. On the coast limestone cliffs and beaches, locally called conches, alternate. There are five of these, varying in size from the smallest, measuring only some hundreds of metres (conche of the pigeonnier ) to the largest ( the grande conche ), which spreads across about 2600 metres between the marina and the cliffs of Vallière in the nearby commune of Saint-Georges-de-Didonne. All are covered with extremely fine sand (of the order of 180 µm). Their formation seems to have occurred approximately 8000 years ago.