Nerja • Gibraltar • Tarifa
Spain’s famous Costa del Sol is so bad, it’s interesting. To northern Europeans, the sun is a drug, and this is their needle. Anything resembling a quaint fishing village has been bikini-strangled and Nivea-creamed. Oblivious to the concrete, pollution, ridiculous prices, and traffic jams, tourists lie on the beach like game hens on skewers—cooking, rolling, and sweating under the sun.
Where Europe’s most popular beach isn’t crowded by high-rise hotels, most of it’s in a freeway choke hold. Wonderfully undeveloped beaches between Tarifa and Cádiz, and east of Almería, are ignored, while human lemmings make the scene where the coastal waters are so polluted that hotels are required to provide swimming pools. It’s a fascinating study in human nature. The Costa del Sol has suffered through the recent economic crisis: Real estate, construction, and tourism had powered the economy, and the effects of its decline are still apparent. Crime and racial tension have risen, as many once-busy individuals are now without work.
Particularly in the resorts west of Málaga, most of the foreign visitors are British—you’ll find beans on your breakfast plate and Tom Jones for Muzak. Spanish visitors complain that some restaurants have only English menus, and indeed, the typical expats here actually try not to integrate. I’ve heard locals say of the British, “If they could, they’d take the sun back home with them—but they can’t, so they stay here.” They enjoy English TV and radio, and many barely learn a word of Spanish. (Special school buses take British children to private English-language schools that connect with Britain’s higher-education system.) For an insight into this British community, read the free local expat magazines.
Laugh with Ronald McDonald at the car-jammed resorts. But if you want a place to stay and play in the sun, unroll your beach towel at Nerja, the most appealing beach-resort town on the coast. And don’t forget that you’re surprisingly close to jolly olde England: The land of tea and scones, fish-and-chips, pubs and bobbies awaits you—in Gibraltar. Although a British territory, Gibraltar has a unique cultural mix that makes it far more interesting than the anonymous resorts that line the coast. Beyond “The Rock,” the whitewashed port of Tarifa—the least-developed piece of Spain’s generally overdeveloped southern coast—is a workaday town with a historic center, broad beaches, and good hotels and restaurants. Most importantly, Tarifa is the perfect springboard for a quick trip to Morocco. These three places alone—Nerja, Gibraltar, and Tarifa—make the Costa del Sol worth a trip.
My negative opinions on the “Costa del Turismo” are valid for peak season (mid-July-mid-Sept). If you’re there during a quieter time and you like the ambience of a beach resort, it can be a pleasant stop. Off-season it can be neutron-bomb quiet.
The whole 150 miles of coastline takes six hours by bus or three hours to drive with no traffic jams. You can resort-hop by bus across the entire Costa del Sol and reach Nerja for dinner. If you want to party on the beach, it can take as much time as Mazatlán.
To day-trip to Tangier, Morocco, head for Tarifa.