Croydon

Lourdes

The gare de Lourdes is a railway station in Lourdes, Occitanie, France. The station is located on the Toulouse - Bayonne railway line. The station is served by TGV (high speed trains), Intercités de Nuit (night trains), Intercités (long distance) and TER (local) services operated by the SNCF.

The station is important for those coming to Lourdes on Catholic Pilgrimages, with extra trains running to Lourdes at certain times.

Train services The following services currently call at Lourdes:

• intercity services (Intercités) Hendaye - Bayonne - Pau - Tarbes - Toulouse
• local service (TER Nouvelle-Aquitaine) Bayonne - Pau - Tarbes
• local service (TER Occitanie) Toulouse - Saint-Gaudens - Tarbes - Pau

Lourdes (, also US: , French: [luʁd]; Occitan: Lorda [ˈluɾðɔ]) is a small market town lying in the foothills of the Pyrenees. It is part of the Hautes-Pyrénées department in the Occitanie region in south-western France. Prior to the mid-19th century, the town was best known for the Château fort de Lourdes, a fortified castle that rises up from a rocky escarpment at its center. In 1858 Lourdes rose to prominence in France and abroad due to the Marian apparitions claimed to have been seen by the peasant girl Bernadette Soubirous, who was later canonized. Shortly thereafter the city with the Sanctuary of Our Lady of Lourdes became one of the world's most important sites of pilgrimage and religious tourism. Today Lourdes hosts around six million visitors every year from all corners of the world. This constant stream of pilgrims and tourists transformed quiet Lourdes into the second most important center of tourism in France, second only to Paris, and the third most important site of international Catholic pilgrimage after Rome and the Holy Land. As of 2011, of French cities only Paris had more hotel capacity.