Successful bet for the replica of the Cosquer cave in Marseille. Its promoters applauded this Tuesday, May 30, the milestone of some 800,000 visitors welcomed since the opening a year ago of this vast underwater cavern of the Mediterranean adorned with masterpieces of prehistoric art. "It was an ambition that seemed unreasonable but was achieved because the project was very beautiful and the professionals who took care of it are frighteningly effective," Renaud Muselier, president of the Provence-Alpes-Côte-d'Azur region, told reporters.
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It works from 3 to 95 years old. There is the cave that is buried and is doomed to disappear and there is an exciting scientific background. (...) There is drawing, art, it is something that fascinates the collective imagination, "abounded Geneviève Rossillon, boss of the Kléber Rossillon group, designer and manager of the site.
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'Organised' tourism rather than 'mass' tourism
For the next few years, Kléber Rossillon is still counting on the attraction of the novelty to attract an equivalent number of visitors, before aiming "at cruising speed" about 500,000 annual entries within three or four years, said Geneviève Rossillon.
In the coming weeks, the site will also host an "exploration cabin" allowing virtual reality circulation in the original cavern. "The challenge for us is to develop organizations that make us not in mass tourism but in organized tourism," commented Renaud Muselier. "The Cosquer Cave is fully in there," he said, praising the ease of access to the site, where a reservation is required for any visit. "This is what we are developing with the regional tourism committee throughout the region, in order to break down these trips and ensure that the region remains attractive despite the number of visitors," he concluded.
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The original cave is over 30,000 years old
After the announcement in 1991 of the discovery by the diver Henri Cosquer of this cave more than 30,000 years old in the depths of the creeks of Marseille, the idea of making a replica for a wide audience had quickly germinated.
But it was not until 2016 that the PACA Region decided to implement it at the Villa Méditerranée. This modern but unused building was indeed ideally located next to the Mucem, the Museum of European and Mediterranean Civilizations, in the heart of France's second city. The third replica of a prehistoric cave in France, after those of Lascaux in Dordogne and Chauvet in Ardèche, already made by Kléber Rossillon, opened its doors to the general public on June 4, 2022.