Étretat is a commune in the Seine-Maritime department in the Haute-Normandie region in northern France. It is a tourist and farming town situated about 32 km northeast of Le Havre, at the junction of the D940, D11 and D139 roads. It's located on the coast of the Pays de Caux area.
Étretat is best known for its cliffs, including three natural arches and the pointed "needle". These cliffs and the associated resort beach attracted artists including Eugène Boudin, Gustave Courbet and Claude Monet, and were featured prominently in the 1909 Arsène Lupin novel The Hollow Needle by Maurice Leblanc.
Two of the three famous arches are seen from the town, the Porte d'Aval, and the Porte d'Amont. The Manneporte is the third and the biggest one, and cannot be seen from the town.
The GR 21 long-distance hiking path passes through the town.
Étretat is known for being the last place in France from which the 1927 biplane The White Bird was seen. French WWI war heroes Charles Nungesser and François Coli were attempting to make the first non-stop flight from Paris to New York, but after the plane's 8 May 1927 departure, it disappeared somewhere over the Atlantic. It is considered one of the great unexplained mysteries of aviation. A monument to the flight was established in Étretat, but destroyed during World War II, during German occupation. A new and taller monument was constructed in 1963, along with a nearby museum.
The economy of Etretat rests mainly on tourism, which gives the locals a growing commercial outlet. The city places itself as the number one tourist attraction in Upper Normandy, as the site most visited along with Bénédictine distillery and museum at Fécamp, the Rouen Cathedral and the Claude Monet Foundation in Giverny.
During the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries the economy was supplemented by kelp-burning on the beaches. The white plumes of smoke by the shore can be clearly seen in George Inness' painting 'Étretat'. "The discovery and development of iodine-rich mineral deposits in Chile about the same time the iodine-from-kelp industry reached full vigor, dealt the kelp industry another severe blow in the late 1870's. However, small quantities of kelp continued to be harvested for soda, potash and iodine in northern France".
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