When somebody mentions the Basque coast, they mean Biarritz or San Sebastián. Between them, just a few kilometres from the Spanish border, sits a town the travel lists routinely skip while surfers never take their eyes off it - Anglet.

It is called „the French California“, and that is not a marketing phrase dreamed up in some agency. The atmosphere genuinely recalls Venice Beach: a wooden boardwalk four and a half kilometres long running the length of the entire shoreline, a cycle path parallel to it, surf schools every hundred metres or so, ice cream parlours, restaurants and beach bars open from morning until night.

What makes Anglet different from its neighbours is the number - eleven wide sandy beaches, separated by rocky breakwaters, running from the mouth of the Adour river to Biarritz's famous lighthouse. And each has its own character. La Barre is calm and green. Cavaliers has powerful waves and regular surf competitions. Des Dunes is favoured by nudists and runs alongside the Chiberta golf course. Sables d'Or has beach volleyball courts and an avenue dedicated to the world's best surfers, something like a Hollywood walk of fame, only with boards.

The last in the row, Petite Chambre d'Amour, carries the most romantic name and the legend that goes with it - about a secret couple who met in a cave in the rocks despite their families' opposition. Above that cave today stands the Tower of Love, a wood and metal structure by Japanese artist Tadashi Kawamata, originally installed for a contemporary art biennial. The response was so good that it stayed permanently, and it is now a viewpoint taking in the whole coast.

Behind the beaches lie the Pignada and Lazarte forests - 250 hectares of pine and wild vegetation, for walking, cycling or riding. There, beside the river, works Notox, a workshop hand-making ecological surfboards that can be taken apart. In the same town the González family has been weaving chisteras for five generations - the baskets used in Basque pelota - from chestnut, willow rods and leather. Grandfather Jean-Louis, son Peio and grandson Bixente, a professional player, sit together and spend dozens of hours on each piece, because every player wants their own.

Historically, Anglet was a rural place of vineyards, forests and gardens that fed the surrounding towns. That heritage survives in the Mendi greenhouses, where the Mendiburu family is in its third generation of horticulture in the middle of the town centre. At the Halles des 5 Cantons market, open Tuesday to Sunday mornings, you find genuine Bayonne ham, goat and cow cheeses, goose from a local farm and biodynamic wines drunk with oysters.

This part of the Balkans has a sea but no ocean. This is the other thing - a wave that drills into you, wind that never lets up and a coast where summer means moving rather than lying down. For a driving holiday it is far; for a weekend by plane it is not. Worth at least knowing it exists, instead of every summer plan ending up at the same three destinations.