Royal Picardy

Le Touquet-Paris-Plage (French pronunciation: [lə tukɛ paʁi plaʒ] ; Picard: Ech Toutchet-Paris-Plache), commonly referred to as Le Touquet (), is a commune near Étaples, in the Pas-de-Calais department, northern France. It has a permanent population of 4,224 (2023) but it welcomes up to 250,000 people during the summer, so the population at any given time during high season in summer swells to about 30,000. Located on the Opal Coast of the English Channel at the estuary of the river Canche, the commune is one of the most renowned seaside resorts in France, with a wide range of sports and leisure activities. The name "Le Touquet" is attested in the mid-18th century to designate the cape next to which the town was built. Alphonse Daloz, a notary in Paris, bought the land on the cape, planted a forest and built a small palace there, and in 1882 founded the seaside resort as Paris-Plage. John Whitley, an English businessman, saw a lucrative opportunity to build a resort for (mostly) English and French elites, so he became the owner of most of the town's lands. The construction boom that followed his acquisition led to the government recognising Paris-Plage as a separate commune in 1912. Numerous prestigious hotels were built, and at its peak of prosperity in the Roaring Twenties, the resort boasted the biggest casino in France by revenue, ultra-luxury hotels and an upscale clientele. The bustling town had good transport connections thanks to a tram line and a narrow-gauge train line to Étaples, and, since 1936, a dedicated airport. The Great Depression brought some problems to the resort but it still remained popular with the British upper class. World War II, however, brought extensive destruction as the Germans deployed about 100,000 mines and the Allies bombarded the resort in 1944. After World War II, most of the upper class chose vacations on the French Riviera instead, and the property they sold was bought up by well-off locals. While most of the original buildings were lost due to destruction during World War II, some surviving villas represent the unique architectural style that was popular in the interwar period. 21 buildings in the commune are protected as historical monuments. Le Touquet also has extensive natural heritage protection because of its dunes and the unique nature of the Canche estuary. This, together with its initial inception as an upper-class resort with extensive sports facilities, which it still mostly is, contributes to consistently high positions in quality-of-life rankings. Today, most of its permanent population is retired. President Emmanuel Macron often spends time in Le Touquet and votes there because Brigitte, his wife, has strong ties to the town and inherited a villa in 1985.

Villa La Prairie is one of the most distinctive productions of French architect Louis Quételart. The villa is located in the golf area of Le Touquet, alongside other villas built in the 1920s and 1930s, of which one was owned by Somerset Maugham and P.G. Wodehouse. Commonly referred to as La Prairie, the villa, built in 1928, is part of the French heritage inventory (Base Mérimée). It is of both Flemish and Picard influence, and unlike vast villas of that time of Anglo-Normand style, it has proved to embody the quintessential French villa, with large French window, big room sizes, and a living-room big enough to be called a ball room.

The Opal Coast (Côte d'Opale (French) French pronunciation: [kot dɔpal]; Opoalkust (West Flemish)) is a coastal region in northern France on the English Channel, popular with tourists.

The river Canche (French pronunciation: [kɑ̃ʃ]; Dutch: Kwinte) is one of the rivers that flow from the plateau of southern Boulonnais and Picardy, into the English Channel, of which the Somme is the largest example. It is 100.2 km (62.3 mi) long. The basin of the Canche extends to 1,274 square kilometres (492 mi2) and lies in the south of the département of Pas-de-Calais. Forming an alluvial valley from 1 to 2 kilometres (0.6 to 1.2 mi) wide, the Canche valley also contains marshes, meadows and small woods. The gentle gradient, averaging 1.5 percent, gives the river a meandering course. The river rises at Gouy-en-Ternois and passes Frévent, Hesdin, and Montreuil-sur-Mer before leaving the chalk to flow to the coast between Étaples and Le Touquet-Paris-Plage. Its principal tributaries are the Ternoise, the Planquette, the Créquoise, the Bras de Bronne, the Course, the Dordogne (not to be confused with the Dordogne) and the Huitrepin which all join on its right bank, i.e. to the north of the Canche. The lie of the land means there is no notable tributary from the south until the Grande Tringue, which flows from marshland into the small, dredged estuary.

The rail line between Étaples and Paris-Plage (EP) was a local metre gauge railway line that operated in the Pas-de-Calais department from 1900 to 1940. It connected the seaside resort of Le Touquet (known at the time of the line's opening as Paris-Plage) to the Étaples station. This electified route carried heavy passenger traffic, reaching up to 32 trains per day during the interwar period. The six-kilometre railway was seriously damaged during the German invasion of France in 1940 and has never been since restored.

Aer Lingus Flight 164 was a scheduled Boeing 737-200 passenger flight that was hijacked on 2 May 1981, on route from Dublin in Ireland to London in England.

Étaples Military Cemetery is a Commonwealth War Graves Commission cemetery in Étaples, near Boulogne on the north-west coast of France. The cemetery holds over 11,500 dead from both World War I and World War II.

The canton of Étaples is a canton situated in the Pas-de-Calais département and in the Hauts-de-France region of France.

Étaples or Étaples-sur-Mer (French pronunciation: [etapl syʁ mɛʁ]; Picard: Étape or Étape-su-Mér; formerly Dutch: Stapele; West Flemish: Stoapel) is a commune in the department of Pas-de-Calais, Hauts-de-France, northern France. It is a fishing and leisure port on the Canche river.

Cucq (French pronunciation: [kyk]; unofficially also: Cucq-Trépied-Stella-Plage; West Flemish: Kuuk) is a commune in the Pas-de-Calais department in the Hauts-de-France region of France. It is made up of three villages: Cucq itself, the village of Trépied in the north and the coastal resort of Stella-Plage to the west.

Étaples-Le Touquet is a railway station serving the towns Étaples and Le Touquet, both in the Pas-de-Calais department, northern France. The station is located in the centre of Étaples.

Camiers (French pronunciation: [kamje]) is a commune in the Pas-de-Calais department in Hauts-de-France in France.