Chapelle Notre-Dame-des-Cyclistes (Géou)

Labastide-d'Armagnac

This former chapel of the hamlet of Géou occupies the site of a Gallo-Roman villa of the Late Empire, then of a Templar fortress whose neighbouring castle was destroyed in 1355 by the Black Prince. The present building, Romanesque in origin, became a parish church again around 1270. In 1958, the Landes priest Father Joseph Massie, a cycling enthusiast, rediscovered it overrun with ivy and proposed making it a sanctuary dedicated to racing cyclists; it was inaugurated as the National Sanctuary of Cyclists on 18 May 1959. Pope John XXIII placed it under the patronage of Our Lady of the Visitation. It houses a museum displaying champions' jerseys (Bobet, Anquetil, Merckx, Hinault) and a stained-glass window designed by the former rider Henry Anglade. The Tour de France has passed this way several times (1984, 1989, 1995, 2000, 2017, 2023). The building is registered as a monument historique.

Getting there : Open to visitors (adjoining cycling museum), annual Mass on Whit Monday

Opening times and access details are given as a guide only: check before you set out.

Ambient sound