It is an exceptionally lively beach. During most of the year, surfers invade it or kites cross the sky. A privileged place for the waves and the wind called La Franqui. It is a commune in the municipality of Leucate, in the south of France, just an hour's drive from Figueres; an hour and a half from Girona; and two and a half from Barcelona.
The large beach of La Franqui, known as the Plage des Coussoules, enjoys about 300 windy days annually thanks to its orientation and orography. Its 8 kilometers of sand are very exposed to the tramontana and closed, at its southern end, by a plateau of hundred-year-old pines. Conditions that make it optimal for practicing water sports such as windsurfing, kitesurfing and wing foiling.
That is why, in addition to having good schools to learn these disciplines, La Franqui also hosts the Wind World Cup every year. Six days of competition –on variable dates, between April and the beginning of May– in which the great dominators of these specialties meet (among them, several Spaniards who have already conquered the podium). The program is completed with musical performances, skateboard and trial exhibitions, and children's entertainment.
However, in times past, the wind and the cliffs of La Franqui had a sinister reputation. Some ships were shipwrecked when they collided, in the middle of a storm, against the rocks.
In fact, on several occasions throughout history, the need to have a port was raised. There is evidence of a first plan already in the 13th century. In the 17th century, the military engineer Sébastien Le Prestre de Vauban –an eminence in terms of fortifications and the art of siege– took up the idea again. And around the same time the creator of the Canal du Midi, the engineer Pierre-Paul Riquet, also proposed that its waterway flow into La Franqui.
Even Napoleon Bonaparte was interested in the possibility of a port. In 1857 the project would be put back on the table, but on that occasion it did not come to fruition either.
What did arrive, months later, was the train. On February 20, 1858, the Leucate-La Franqui station was inaugurated, giving a boost to the local economy. La Franqui would become a privileged destination for summer tourists in search of sun, sea and healthy air.
The first to benefit from this push were spas and hotels. Among them the Bertand, the oldest hotel in the place, later called Excelsior. A prosperous family establishment attached to a cliff, which welcomed members of the petty bourgeoisie, workers and grape harvesters. The reputation of his restaurant also attracted some select clients, such as the painter Paul Gauguin.
The navigator, adventurer and writer Henry de Monfreid (1879-1974) grew up there. The son of Amélie Bertrand –whose family owned the hotel– and the painter and art collector George-Daniel de Monfreid, he was already attracted to the sea during his childhood. At just 4 years old, he embarked on a yacht from Port-Vendres to Sète, then to Majorca and finally to Algiers. At 7, however, he was sent to study in Paris. There he would meet, through his father, artists of the stature of Toulouse-Lautrec and Matisse.
After failing in his studies to become a civil engineer, Henry de Monfreid would chain small-time jobs for a few years... Until he finally found a way to embark on new horizons. By coming into contact with an Ethiopian businessman, he opened a stage, in the 1910s, in which he could live on horseback from Ethiopia and Djibouti. The adventurer built his own ships to move around. The most famous of which, a 25 meter long schooner called Altaïr.
The young man devoted himself to smuggling: pearls, weapons, hashish, morphine... And to facilitate his dealings, he decided to convert to Islam under the name of Abd-el-Hay. Precisely thanks to this new identity and his knowledge of the area, he also worked as a spy during the First World War. He followed for France the movements of the Turkish army on the coasts of Yemen.
Later he met the journalist and writer Joseph Kessel in the Red Sea, who, fascinated by his hurricane personality, encouraged him to publish his adventures. Henry de Monfreid would go so far as to sign fifty titles, which would earn him notable fame in his country from the 1930s.
The last great maritime adventure reached its 79 years. In La Réunion he embarked for the island of Mauritius in the company of his son Daniel, a captain and a sailor. The ship drifted until, eight days after her departure, she was rescued near Madagascar. From this experience came another book, Mon aventure à l'île des Forbans.
Montfried remains an icon of La Franqui, a contradictory figure – as admired as criticized – who has made several generations of French readers sigh.
