Where

L’Albir (a.k.a. El Albir or just plain old Albir to its friends), Valencia province, Costa Blanca, Spain.

The Costa Blanca is the bit of Mediterranean coast in the province of Alicante, running from Denia in the north to Pilar de la Horadada in the south.

L’Albir is a small town located at one end of a big bay. At the other end of the bay is Calpe (a.k.a. Calp), in the middle of the bay is the white-washed town of Altea.

Albir is actually part of the larger conurbation of L’Alfas del Pi, which is mostly further inland.

L’Albir backs onto La Serra Gelada Natural Park and on the other side of this is the infamous resort of Benidorm.

L’Albir is about one hour’s drive from Alicante (south), and an hour and a half drive from Velencia (north).

When

We first tried to visit Albir at Easter 2020 but due to the pandemic the whole of Spain went into can´t-leave-your-house lockdown and so we had to cancel our trip. Luckily, later on in 2020 restrictions were lifted a little and though the pandemic was still happening, in July 2020 we were able to visit Albir.

We loved our time in Albir and during the second pandemic winter, when again our lives were restricted to Navarra, we dreamed of being back at the Albir Palace. So we returned in June 2021.

And then again in 2024 we wanted a trip that was simple, easy and fun – so we came back again. I think it´s become the go-to place for our family.

Why

We initially booked to travel to L’Albir for our Easter holiday in 2020. We only had five days available so we decided to take a trip to the south coast of Spain, which is about eight-hours drive away from where we live in Pamplona. I’d originally been looking to stay in cool Calpe, which has a fabulous rock, but accommodation here was a little pricey – so I expanded the search and found the good-looking, toddler friendly Albir Palace Aparthotel, at the other end of the bay, in L’Albir. We loved that visit so much, that we´ve since returned twice.

L’Albir is a great little place: it’s a resort town, but also residential. If you’re looking for typical Spain, this is not it, but if you’re looking for an easy, relaxed, quiet place to be, with lots of food options, good accommodation, nice views and access to tours and pretty countryside, then this is the place for you. We love it. Being close to the holiday-town of Benidorm there are lots of tours and holidayish things to do near-by, but also lots of beautiful nature.

For us a visit to Albir is simple, easy and fun. Being in Spain we can access health services and banks, go to our usual supermarket, get our favourite snacks etc. – while also being able to access the foreign products and services we can´t get in our city up north. There´s loads of cool things to do in the area, we´re never bored, and we can relax here too.

Although it might not be for a few years, I´m sure we´ll be back.

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Getting there and getting around

Each time we have been to L’Albir we have driven, usually with an overnight stop en-route. L’Albir is on the AP-7 motorway. It´s about an hour and a half drive from Valencia, through some beautiful scenery. It is an hour drive from Alicante.

Airports to L’Albir

The closest airports to L’Albir are Alicante and Valencia.

The best way to get from Alicante airport to L’Albir is to take the Alsa bus direct from Alicante airport to Benidorm, then get a tram or bus from Benidorm to L’Albir (see below for more information on this). Alsa is the main long distance bus company in Spain. You can get Alsa bus times and book tickets, in English, at the Alsa website. I’ve just had a look and the buses from Alicante airport to Benidorm seem to go every hour, the journey is about an hour and it currently costs €8 (August 2024).

Similar to above, the best way to get from Valencia Airport to L’Albir is to get the Metro from the airport to Valencia bus station, then to take the Alsa bus from Valencia to Benidorm, and to then make your way to L’Albir from Benidorm.

Depending on which bus you get, the journey from Valencia to Benidorm can take either 1 hour 45 minutes or 4 hours 25 minutes – be careful which bus you book. The current price is €18.

Tram / Light Railway

There is a tram / light railway that runs from Alicante to Benidorm (Line L1) and then from Benidorm to Denia (Line L9). The Benidorm-Denia tram passes through L’Alfas de Pi, L’Albir, Altea and Calpe.

It is quite a slow method of transport due to the number of stops. For example the tram from Alicante to Benidorm takes an hour and a half, whereas the ALSA bus takes 45 minutes.

The price of the ticket depends on the number of zones you travel. Benidorm and L’Albir are both in Zone D. You can see a zone map here and get information on ticket prices here.

For us, even though I love trains, this just isn’t a convenient mode of transport as the station is quite far out of L’Albir centre. If we were going to Calpe we might get the train, but for Altea and Benidorm it has been easier to get the bus or drive.

www.tramalacant.es

Bus

Bus 10 runs between Benidorm and Altea. It runs about every 20 minutes and stops on Avenida del l’Albir. You can see the current timetable here (click on the stop for the times for that stop). A single ticket is €1.55. You can buy your ticket on the bus. It took us about 40 minutes to get from Albir to downtown Benidorm.

alicante.avanzagrupo.com

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What we did on our holiday

Beach – Playa de Racó de l’Albir

The beach in L’Albir is not that great: it’s rocky, not that wide, the sea is stony and drops down pretty quickly, plus every time we have been there there have been really strong currents. I took my son for a paddle on our last visit and I really didn´t feel safe, the sea was so strong. That said, the beach is a beautiful location – with azul seas, sail boats, palm trees and the rock at Calpe off in the distance. It´s not an easy beach to be on, what with the rocks and the strong seas, but if all you want to do is laze in the sun, it´s great.

On the beach, on all of our trips, there were lifeguards, pedalos and sunbeds available for hire and play areas for kids. There’s a nice, palm tree lined boardwalk to stroll along and some nice restaurants and cafes on the sea front (and an Ale-Hop shop).

The tourist office is also located by the beach.

Altea

Altea is a gorgeous town located half-way around the bay. We had originally looked at Altea as a possible place to stay – but I’m quite relieved that we didn’t as Altea, we discovered, is pretty steep!

Altea is a much more significant town than L’Albir, with more shops, facilities, tram stops etc. The sea front area has a beautiful promenade and lots of cafes and restaurants overlooking the sea. If we were to stay in Altea we would probably stay in this sea-front strip.

The centre of the town is the old, medieval walled district – a gorgeous area of white washed, flower-bedecked houses, lanes of Escher like stair-cases, small cobbled squares with occasional glimpses of the blue, blue sea, all topped by the big church with its sparkly, blue-tiled dome. It’s a nice place to get lost in. There are also lots of trinket shops to browse and some very nice restaurants.

Altea is not toddler friendly. The roads up are steep and stepped, the pavements sometimes very thin and totally not suitable for pushchairs, so thank you to my husband who looked after our son while I went for an explore. (Incidentally, if you do have trouble walking but would like to see the walled town there is limited parking at the top of the hill and space to be dropped off).

www.visitaltea.es

Alicante

We went to Alicante because it was there. It seemed silly to be so close to such a significant city, that we could easily access by car, and to not go visit it – so we had a day trip here.

My first impressions of Alicante weren’t that positive to be honest: the landscape is dry, desert-like, golden rock – quite bleak. The town, as we drove in, seemed like a big sprawl. However, once we were downtown I did start to like the city. The centre seems to have some very nice, palm-tree lined boulevards, great beaches and good shopping.

We stupidly hadn’t done any comprehensive research about what to see. I glanced at Wikitravel so I knew there was a castle and an old town, but that was it. We parked up in Corte Ingles (great for cheap parking and baby-changing facilities) and then we somehow stumbled on the old town while looking for lunch. We ended up having pizza at Sale & Peppe Barrio, next to the closed cathedral and the third most popular ice-cream shop in Spain (Livanti Gelato di Sicilia), then we went to find the castle.

Castillo Santa Barbara is a really cool, 9th century castle that you can travel to on a lift, inside a mountain. The castle sits up on a rocky crag, overlooking the sea, looking like it’s going to fall off onto the city at any moment. This Muslim castle is one of the largest medieval fortresses in Spain.

Sadly for us, while we were there there were restrictions on visiting Castillo Santa Barbara due to the pandemic. The lift to the top was closed, so to get to the top you’d have to drive or walk (which we didn’t want to do in the heat, with a baby), and we think you could only visit the castle with a pre-booked guided tour.

Entrance to the castle is free. A return trip on the elevator is about €2.70. The official webpage is in Spanish, but if you scroll to the bottom you can download an English guide for kids.

So instead of doing the one touristy thing we’d planned to do we walked back to Corte Ingles along the pretty promenade – and that was it…

My impression of Alicante is that it had great trees (there’s a huge beauty by the castle lift entrance), a nice beach and is a nice city to be in – but there’s not that much to see as a tourist.

According to Atlas Obscura we missed the Archaeological Museum (MARQ), which has Roman antiquities, and the cool Central Market Building. Wikitravel says we missed the Island of Tabarca and some great beaches.

www.alicante.com

Benidorm

My first impression of Benidorm was that it was quite nice, with lots of wide streets and lots of green space. On our first trip we drove through the outskirts of Benidorm, just to have a look-see, and it seemed like a pretty pleasant tourist town.

My second impression of Benidorm was that it was a messy sprawl – with some nice bits.

On our second trip my son had a habit of waking us up at 6.30 every morning – so one day my husband just decided to jump on a bus to Benidorm to keep him occupied – and then I went to join them later. In Benidorm the boys went to a huge playground by the library, then we met up to have a walk along the promenade and a play on the beach, and then they went home while I went swimsuit shopping and explored the ´old town´.

There were a few pedestrianised streets, which were nice for a potter about. There weren´t many high-street chains here, though there were a lot of independent clothes and sweet shops. There were also lots of nice cafes and restaurants.

I really wanted to like Benidorm. I really wanted to defy the critics – but I didn´t like it. Downtown Benidorm was messy. The beach was great, there were lots of shops and cafes – but everything felt like a jumbly sprawl to me. However, it is a huge tourist destination for a reason. The sand on the beach is golden, the sea sparkly and blue and there are lots of great restaurants, touristy shops and some attractions. I was glad we were staying next-door in low-key Albir though, which felt more like a proper town than a splatter of tourist infrastructure.

Obviously, being a huge holiday spot, there is a lot to do in Benidorm. Tripkay has a list of 10 highlights of Benidorm. I´ve also included information about the waterparks, theme park, sea-life centre and zoo in the What We Didn´t Do section below. You can also get lots of useful information (in English) at visitbenidorm.es.

Information about getting the bus to Benidorm is in the Getting There section above.

In downtown Benidorm we got off the bus at the end of the line – by the psychedelic panda, which was part of an art exhibition by Taiwanese artist Hung Yi. These animals were only in Benidorm until September 2021 though, so now you´ll have to find other ways to navigate. To be honest, I don´t need to tell you this – I just wanted an excuse to include these photos…

Guadalest

The one place that I was really sad we didn´t get to on the first trip was Guadalest – and in fact I only found out about this fantastic village after doing research for the first version of this Albir page.  Guadalest is a small town located in Guadalest Valley, about 25km inland. Lots of excursions go here.

Guadalest is so cool! It´s high up in the mountains, and the village is built on and around a rock formation – with random bits of castles on sticky out rocks. You even have to go through a foot tunnel to get to the upper, hidden village.

As it´s a hugely popular destination for tourists, a lot of other quirky attractions have been created in the village. These include Antonio Marco’s miniature museum (how will we fit?), a motorcycle museum, a Gigantic-Small museum, where you can see giant sculptures and miniatures by the artist Manuel Ussa, including a bullfighting ring built on the head of a pin; a salt and pepper shaker museum (why didn’t we go?!?) and a medieval torture museum.

The village is divided into two sections: The Arrabal, the main part of the village, where the car parks, tourist information and post office are; and the Castle area, where the castle is.

As we had a toddler with us, we split into two to visit Guadalest. There was a really nice playground in the main town, so J took S here for a play while I explored the hidden part of the village and the castle – then we swapped.

To get to the castle and the inner village you have to walk through the main ´outer´village, then up a steep staircase and through a foot tunnel (Portal de San Josep).

Just past the foot tunnel is Orduña House, which is also the entrance to the castle. You can tour the house, which contains traditional 19th century furniture.  I didn´t, as I didn´t have a lot of time. I just passed through on my way to the castle.

The castle is built on and around the rocks, around the inner village – so if you visit you enter at one end of the village and exit at the other end.

The first part of the castle tour is up metal stairways, over the rocks, past the fabulously photogenic bell-tower – sitting up on a pinacle, overlooking the valley way below. I don´t think the tower is accessible to the public.

Next is the main castle, which is a good castle for clomping over and looking out at the views. It´s all open and exposed – there aren´t any rooms. Along the stairways are pictures of the signs of the cross and there´s a cemetary quite close to the top. The castle is amazing because of its stunning, ingenious location and for the amazing views from its walls. The castle was originally built by Muslims in the 9th century, and was added to over the years. It was mostly destroyed by an earthquake in 1644. You can find out more about the different sections of the castle at guadalest.es (you can change the language to English in the bottom right hand corner).

The exit from the castle is at the far end of the inner village. Also in this area of the village are some wonderful panoramic views over the lake and the valley, the miniature museum, some restaurants and touristy shops, and a pretty church.

We finished our trip with lunch in a restaurant with a view to bring joy to your heart…

We drove to Guadalest. It took us about thirty minutes to drive here from Albir and there was lots of parking in the village. There was a tourist information centre and toilets in the car park. I think it cost us about €2 to park here.

Apparently bus 16 runs from Benidorm to Guadalest, departing at 9.45 and getting in at 11.00, then coming back at 13.30. However, it wasn´t clear if this bus was running when we were there and it doesn´t appear on Google Maps, who offer an alternative route run by Alsa.

Shopped

So for those coming from the UK, this probably won’t impress you – but I bought pickle and it was one of the best things I did on holiday. (That and splashing around in the pool with my son). For some reason, in Pamplona it’s really difficult to get international food options, so when we can access pickle, Cadbury’s chocolate, Ribena etc, I (and my friends) get very excited. There were a few ‘international’ food stores in Albir town, and even just the Consum Supermarket carried a wide range of international products.

Also in town there were a couple of nice random-crap stores which sold everything, a Mercadona supermarket, an Aldi and a Lidl. There’s also a Pep & Co, which is the new name for Poundland. They sell cheap clothes, toys, stationary, household items and some British food products.

On my second trip I discovered the Costa Blanca Supermarket, which is on the edge of Alfas del Pi. This is a supermarket that is more for northern Europeans (Scandinavians, Germans, Low Countries etc) and it had lots of interesting products which I just haven´t been able to find in Northern Spain. Lots of international sauces etc. They also had a large vegetarian / vegan section. supercostablanca.es.

Visited the Guardia Civil

On the last night of our first visit we planned to go to La Roca, the Caribbean grill restaurant. I was so excited about getting some hot spicy chicken and pineapple – but it wasn’t to be, as numpty here lost my wallet. If it was just the case of cancelling bank cards this wouldn’t have been too much of an issue, as I always carry a spare card in a different location (see Jen’s practical safety advice for more good travel safety ideas) – and I could have used this card until we got home. The problem was that we had driven to Albir and my driving licence was in the wallet – and in Spain, by law,  you have to have your driving licence when you are driving.

I needed to get an official certificate to allow me to temporarily drive without a licence, but we weren´t actually sure how to do this. So first of all we went to the local police station, which is in the neighbouring town of L’Alfas del Pie. The police here were very nice but couldn’t help us as we had to talk to the Guardia Civil – who are in Altea (they’re just by the Altea tram stop). So off we popped to see the Guardia Civil but by now it was quite late and (luckily it would turn out) they were unable to help us that evening and we would have to come back the next morning.

Anyhoo, I had a feeling we would find it. And we did find it – in the most random place. Somehow (probably while I was distracted by a small child) my wallet had fallen underneath my windscreen wipers, in a well underneath my car bonnet – so it had been there all along. Luckily my husband found it while we were packing up, so we were able to drive home with no more fuss.

So on the one hand I didn’t get Caribbean food overlooking the sea, but we did learn a lot and I’m really proud of both of us that we managed to navigate Spanish bureaucracy, in Spanish.

(And we finally got to La Roca a year later and it was worth the wait…)

Aqualiandia

Aqualandia is a waterpark on the edge of Benidorm. It has fifteen slides, some with superlatives (highest something or other), loads of play pools for kids and a spa area for the adults. You can find out about their slides here.

On our first trip to Albir, our son went into a swimming pool for the first time ever. Since that time he has developed a love of water-parks so on our most recent visit we dedicated a day to visiting Aqualandia.

Aqualandia is great for all ages and all adrenaline requirements as it´s so big and there are so many different areas to play in. As my son is only five we spent most of our visit at Adventureland, which is a young kids area which has twelve slides, including two slides for inflatable rings, lots of water jets and a water ball-pit. It was shallow enough to be safe for non-swimmers. There were quite a lot of trees around this area so we based ourselves on a shaded sun-bed here.

We also spent time at Laguna, which is an area for even smaller kids, which has jets, small slides and inflatables to ride around on.

We bought our tickets online, in advance, and they cost us €35 per adult and €27 per child. At the park we bought a locker (€7) and a sun-bed (€7). Most people, including us, went to the locker room right by the entrance, but there are other locker areas and I think if we went back again I would go to the lockers by Adventureland, so I could have easier access to my stuff.

With the sun beds you get a ticket from the machine in the locker room and then you just go find an empty sun bed to use.

We bought a picnic, snacks and drinks in with us, but we could have bought fast food or snacks at the park and they didn´t seem too overpriced.

We visited Aqualandia on what was probably one of the busiest (and hottest) days of the year, but it was fine and never felt too crowded. Perhaps if we had gone on some of the bigger rides we might have had to queue, but where we were never felt overcrowded. All-in-all, we spent about six hours here. We could easily have stayed longer but after six hours of constant splashing about in the strong sun, we felt that we´d probably had enough.

Mundomar is a sea-life centre, located next to Aqualandia. Here you can swim with dolphin and sea-lions. There are also birds, lemurs and monkeys (I don’t think they’re under water. I hope not.), turtles etc. Mundomar is connected to Aqualandia, though sadly I don´t think the dolphin ever get to use the slides at the water-park. A ticket for Mundomar is €26 for an adult and €22 for a child (Aug 24). You can buy combined tickets for both parks. www.mundomar.es.

Getting there: We drove to the waterpark and parked right outside the gates. Parking was free.

Bus 11 goes from the bus station in Benidorm to Aqualandia; bus 1 goes from Aqualandia to the bus station. You can get times from the Avanza Group website.

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What we didn’t do on our holiday

La Serra Gelada Natural Park

La Serra Gelada Natural Park (a.k.a. Sierra Helada (ice mountain) / Gelada National Park) is the hilly area at the back of Albir, by the sea. At sea-level, this natural park is an area of caves and coves; at mountain level this is a beautiful hill with fantastic views over the bay towards Calpe and neighbouring Benidorm.

There is a nice walk to Albir Lighthouse. This starts by the anchor statue by the beach in Albir. Apparently, it is a pretty gentle walk most of the way. Albir Lighthouse is a beautiful, art-deco like lighthouse on top of the cliffs.

We didn’t do the walk as we weren’t sure how suitable the path would be for pushchairs – but if we come back this is something we’d like to do. I bet the sunsets are gorgeous from the lighthouse. Benidorm Seriously (seriously) has a great guide to three walks in the park, with specific directional information and photos. According to them the lighthouse walk is wheelchair friendly, so we could have done this after all. Oh well.

The official website for the park is only in Spanish and Valencian, but if you click on Cartografía you can download useful maps.

Calpe / Calp

It was the resort town of Calpe that had originally attracted me to this area. Calpe has an amazing rock (Peñón de Ifach) that looks like a mini Rock of Gibraltar. It sits on a spit of land at the end of the beach.

Resort wise, Calpe looks to be more like Benidorm, in that there are lots of high rises and it seems to be more for holiday-makers than residents.

Because of it’s big rock, Calpe has been an important look out for centuries. Apparently Romans, Visigoths and Arabs controlled the area before the Christian reconquista.

You can climb to the top of the rock, through a tunnel bored straight through the rock. However, this is a protected area and so visitors are limited to 300 per day. To visit you have to apply by completing a form. The Turismo de Calpe website explains how to complete the form on their website.

The other big sights in town are Baños de la Reina, Roman fish-farm remains; a gateway and some walls from the medieval fortress; a 16th century watchtower – used to look out for pirates; an archaeological museum; a small salt-lake with flamingos and The Old Church.

You can find town information, in English, here. You can find tourist information at Wikivoyage.

Aqua Natura and Terra Natura Zoo

Aqua Natura is a water-park connected to Terra Natura Zoo in Benidorm.I don´t think you can see the animals from the slides though. That would be so cool! Terra Natura Zoo has elephants, rhino, tigers, birds, donkeys and other animals.

You can find out about Aqua Natura’s rides and slides here. To be honest, Aqualandia looks like the better water-park, but we have a friend who has been here and he says this one is better for small kids as it´s quieter and more gentle.

An adult ticket for the water-park is currently €37 and a child´s ticket €31. And similarly, an adult ticket for zoo is currently €37 and a child´s ticket €31. A combined ticket for the zoo and Aqua Natura is currently €48 for an adult and €40 for a child. (August 2024).

Bus 42 runs from Benidorm bus station to the park.

benidorm.terranatura.com.

Terra Mitica (Myth World) Theme Park

Terra Mitica is a theme park with rides based on the ancient world. There are five zones, based upon ancient cultures of the Mediterranean. For example the swan pedalo ride is called the Port of Alexandria.  You can find out about all of the rides here. They look a bit silly and a lot of fun.

It is in Benidorm. Bus 42 goes from downtown Benidorm to the park. You can get times here. Tickets are around €40 per adult. You can get ticket prices here.

www.terramiticapark.com.

Algar waterfalls (Fuentes de Algar)

The River Algar goes into the sea at Altea. About 15 k.m. upstream there are a series of waterfalls on the river, with great pools to swim in. There are walkways along the waterfalls. There is also a souvenir shop, restaurant, public toilets etc. at the falls. Adult entry is €4 or €5 (depending on the season), kid’s entry is €2.

I think to get here you would need a car or to be on an excursion. Some excursions combine a trip to the falls with a trip to Guadalest.

The website for the falls has all of the information you will need to visit the falls: lasfuentesdelalgar.com.

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Where we stayed

Albir Palace

When you are parents of a toddler you tend to have more specific requirements for accommodation: apartments with separate rooms are better, so you can put them to bed at night but still stay up and not disturb them; a kitchen with microwave and ability to cook and clean yourself is very useful; an apartment without a million things to break is also very important – and so when we were looking for accommodation in this area we focused on apartments for hire, rather than hotels. We chose the Albir Palace because the reviews were fantastic, the pool area looked gorgeous, they had a play area for kids and because there didn’t appear to be hundreds of decorative things for little dude to break in the apartment (even so we had to move a few things up high, take the table cloth off the table so he couldn’t pull on it and push the tv back).

The Albir Palace is a quiet apart-hotel, run by a Norwegian gentleman, located in a residential neighbourhood, up hill in L’Albir, overlooking the Med and the Rock of Calpe.

We love the Albir Palace and we have returned because it is such a great place to stay. We love the pool that is always warm. We love the apartment, which has all of the facilities we could need, including a washing machine. The TV has Spanish, British and Scandinavian channels (this last trip I enjoyed watching the weather forecast for Stockholm). They have a kid´s shed full of toys and a big sand pit. Staying here, as parents, is simple, easy and fun.

My favourite thing at the apartments is the semi-private roof terraces, which are accessed from the apartments. I loved watching the sun rise over the Peñon de Ifach (well, I didn´t as I would have preferred to be in bed, but if I´m going to be woken by a toddler super early then getting to watch the sun rise over the Med is a nice pay-off). I loved sunbathing up here, up in the breeze. I loved going here after dinner with my coffee, to watch the sun set behind the mountains. I could spend an hour watching the valley below, following  cars (it was like being in a plane). I especially loved sitting up here with my husband at night, child in bed, having a drink and watching the stars and satellites overhead. I never do that at home. I can´t do that at home.

Two more positive things to mention: first, the staff are lovely and they were very helpful and efficient when we had to cancel our first booking due to the lockdown. We booked through their website and hadn’t pre-paid but there was no problem with cancelling without fees. Secondly, they leave a bottle of wine in your apartment when you arrive, which is a nice touch.

On our most recent trip we paid €120 per night for a two-bed apartment. However, this was in high-season and we have paid less for the one-bed or at quieter times.

www.albirpalace.com

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Where we ate and drank

Albir has food options from all over the world. It´s one of reasons we love visiting here. There´s an Asian supermarkets selling Korean kimchi, Indonesian restaurants, Norwegian food, British pubs, lots of Japanese options – and even Spanish food too.

Having a young-un it’s much easier for us to eat at home, so most lunches and dinners we made at our apartment.

We did, however, try the following:

La Cena by Nola

Le Cena by Nola is a lovely restaurant. It looks bright and modern, they have a wide-range of international food options, lots of vegetarian choices and they were pretty child-friendly too. We had freshly baked sour-dough rolls with three dips to start and then salmon and chips and vegetarian curry for our mains. I loved the waiter as he poured my wine but then realised he was nearing the end of the bottle – so just poured the rest in too. Also he was really friendly to our toddler who was little bit screechy (sorry people at the next table). Our meal here was a treat and not too expensive.

La Cena by Nola is located on the high street (Avenue de l’Albir) and now they have another branch on the sea-front towards Altea.

Visit their website here.

Wanderlust

Wanderlust is a brunch type place with fairy-lights, pallet furniture, bike parking, international food options, cocktails in mason jars and coffees. To be honest, they are a little over-priced but they were also very nice and very friendly too. I love going here as they have a play area at the back that is really well thought-out, that my son loved. I wish more places had play-areas.

You can view Wanderlust’s menu (in English) here.

Puente de Oro

We don’t have Chinese take-out very often in Spain. Most times I’ve had Chinese food in Pamplona I’ve been very disappointed – and we weren’t planning to have Chinese food in L’Albir either, but by the time we had finished visiting the police on our first visit it was too late to eat in a restaurant and we were too tired to cook – so we decided to do something we hadn’t done for ages and get a Chinese take-away.

And we were pleasantly surprised. The food from Puente de Oro was prepared really quickly and it tasted delicious. English Chinese food tends to be very sweet and gelatinous; Canadian Chinese food tends to be more oily and rich – this was more like Canadian Chinese food and we loved it.

Getting a take-away from here has now become a must-do for a visit to Albir.

Puente de Oro are located on the high street (Avenue de l’Albir). You can view their menus on their facebook page (just scroll down their posts and you´ll find photos of their menus).

La ROCA

I love food that I´m not familiar with – especially if it´s fiery and spicy and involves roasted meats. I was really looking forward to going to La Roca Caribbean Grill on our first trip to Albir. It looked so good we saved it as a treat for our last night. Sadly though, it wasn´t to be because I lost my purse and we had to go to the police to report it, instead of eating delicious Caribbean food overlooking the sea.

I´m not saying the reason we returned to Albir was so we could go to this Caribbean restaurant, but it did play a part in us deciding to go back. I even checked it was still open before we booked our second trip.

It was definitely worth the wait. The food was delicious and so different to what I normally can have. My husband is vegetarian and there were some delicious options for him too. We had amazing vegan patties to start, then chicken and pineapple and a coconut rice with mango for our mains. The food was yum. Sadly, we had a restless toddler with us so we couldn’t stay for dessert.

UPDATE 2024: On our most recent visit, they´d changed their name to La Roca Mediterranean Grill, and looking at the most recent reviews none of them mention Caribbean food, so I´m not sure if they serve Caribbean food anymore. Their website says they do but it might be slightly out of date. I´ll have to go back again to find out.

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Useful links

www.visitalbir.com

www.albir.life

www.spainmadesimple.com/…/albir

You can find lots of useful information on some of the Benidorm and Costa Blanca pages.

wikitravel.org/en/Costa_Blanca

visitbenidorm.es

Disclaimer

Please note, some, if not much of this information may not be correct, or may be out of date. All these articles show is how we found these places when we visited and what we personally thought of each place. Where possible I will include links to site which will contain more up-to-date info. All of this is our own work and any opinion expressed is that of the author only.

All photos copyright of J Clemo-Halpenny, unless otherwise stated. If you would like to copy or reproduce any of these images, please email me to ask permission.