Know province of Alicante!
Things to do in Alicante. Visiting Calpe, Benidorm, Alicante city and Torrevieja.
September 2021
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Calpe
If you are visitng Valencia you may want to visit a beautiful Calpe as well. Calpe is famous for its natural heritage – a cliff jutting into the sea. You can climb it, but we only wanted to go to the beach this time.
While we were looking for a beach, we accidentally stumbled upon interesting and, as it turned out, famous architectural works of the architect Ricardo Bofill. Ricardo Bofill was a Spanish architect from Barcelona. His famous works include such buildings as W hotel Barcelona and Madrid Congress Center.
Xanadu – an iconic work of Ricardo Bofill – a residential complex built in 1968.
Famous building of Ricardo Bofill – an apartment complex Red Wall
Benidorm
On the way to Alicante we stopped in Benidorm to take a photo. Benidorm is simply amazing because of the amount of skyscrapers.
Interesting facts about Benidorm
Benidorm is the most populous city in the area of Marina Baja, with a demographic density of 1,792 inhabitants per km², with population of 70,450 inhabitants in 2020. Benidorm is considered as a tourist capital of the Valencia region. Known as “The New York City of the Mediterranean coast” Benidorm is the city with the most skyscrapers in Spain, the city with the most skyscrapers per capita in the world and the second city in the world with the most skyscrapers per square meter, after New York. Benidorm is one of the most famous tourist destinations in Spain and on the Mediterranean coast known for its beaches and nightlife. In summer the population can reach 400,000 inhabitants.
Alicante
We arrived in Alicante in the evening and got to know the town by the light of street lights. Alicante is a small town, nice for walking: the port and the center – everything is within walking distance.
For dinner, we decided to leave the Spanish cuisine for that night, and went to a Greek restaurant Kalamitsi. As a starter – selection of pâtés (you should definitely try it!) and for the first a hamburger with lamb meat and lamb ribs in honey. Fair price and delicious!
You can find the mushroom street in the center, which undoubtedly attracts a lot of attention. As it turned out, this street has its own unusual and cute story!
Interesting facts about the San francisco street
In the last years of the 20th century, the street looked gloomy, was in a terrible condition and caused a feeling of insecurity among residents due to street prostitution and illegal business operated by immigrants from the Maghreb. Only in the first decade of the 21st century, the city council began to make proposals for solving the problem, such as closing of some businesses or creation of cultural properties. Thus, in the end of 2013, the mayor of Alicante, Sonia Castedo, decided to decorate the street with figures of mushrooms. The floor was painted in yellow and green colour and hopscotch was painted on the floor. Despite initial disputes (the investment was about 60,000 euros), the street attracted the attention of tourists and contributed to the opening of new commerce. Since then, the street is known as the Street of mushrooms.
Torrevieja
Next morning we went to Torrevieja, not to the town itself, but to the salt lagoon “Pink Lagoon“. There are two lagoons in total, the second one is called la-mata salt lagoon.
The pink lagoon is the main attraction of Torrevieja, as its specific pinky color is difficult to find somewhere else. These lagoons are also the main salt mines of the town, salt has always been considered as the “gold” of Torrevieja.
Historical facts about the salt lagoons in Torrevieja
Due to the difficulties and high cost of exploiting the salt lagoons, the King of Aragon Juan I was requested for a permission to build a canal to communicate sea water with the lagoons of Torrevieja, which turned them into fishing grounds. The permission was obtained in 1389, although due to economic issues building works of the canal did not begin until 1482.
In 1486, the salt lagoons of Torrevieja were considered the best salines in the Aragon region that could compete with the famous salines of Ibiza, Tortosa, Amposta and Cullera. Salt of Torrevieja was delivered by sea to Genoa, Naples and Nice, as well as to other Mediterranean ports. This made the salt lagoons of Torrevieja famous all over the Mediterranean coast.
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