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After just coming back from a short business trip to London, my wife and I were sitting together with friends in our garden in the Alicante suburb of San Juan on a warm summer evening.  Whilst sitting together I mentioned a request from Escapeartist for an Alicante article which I received some days before. You should write about “Alicante and how to explore it in one day” – my wife said, because traditional Costa Blanca tourists really won’t have much interest in the city – but more in the beaches, villages and bars around the area. I imagine some of you will come over and spend summer holidays around Costa Blanca in places like Benidorm, Torrevieja, Denia or Calpe. After two months of sunbathing and partying at night, you will finally get your act together and do a one day visit to Alicante – just to be able to tell the loved ones at home that you have seen some culture and arts as well. Come and join me for a walk around Alicante

View of Alicante

The city is best explored by foot starting at the harbour, where many parking areas are available. So we leave our car next to the Melia Hotel right on the harbour entrance. (A quick tip at the beginning, if you arrive at Alicante Airport you can get a very good Alicante map at the tourist information centre at the arrival hall.)
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Just behind the Melia Hotel at the foot of Santa Barbara Castle you find the beach of Postiguet, where at the end of our little walk through Alicante, we will sunbathe. But let’s move on and get some more culture and history.

Directly in front of the Melia Hotel we enter a little road which brings us to the Plaza del Ajuntamento, which means Plaza of City Hall. Alicante’s city hall was originally built in 1688 by the French, later after being heavily damaged it was rebuilt in the 18th century. Lined  by two 35 metre  tall towers, the  stairs of city hall represent “Cero-Point” sea level in Alicante. All measurements of height in Spain refer to this “Cero-point” as the base for their calculations. Within the city hall you can visit the blue salon with its wonderful mirror gallery (Monday to Saturdays). After passing city hall and to the right you will find the Plaza de Santissima Faz, a lovely little area surrounded by palm trees.

As you walk out of the old city centre of Alicante and pass the rather modern street of Rambla de Mendez Nunez, you enter the Avenida Del Teatro. There you will find Alicante’s huge theatre with massive roman style columns at  the entrance. Just the right place for a pleasant evening of entertainment, by the way.  A little bit further along, and if you are walking with children, is the nativity scene museum at San Augustin Street. I have to admit it is a rather strange feeling to watch Christmas scences during the summer, but it’s worth it. The museum contains hundreds of different scenes and figures from all over the world; it will impress any visitor. The entrance is free, just have a look – you will not regret it.

Just around the corner from the nativity museum, you will find the cathedral of San Nicolas de Bari. The neighbour city of Orihuela is the residence of the bishop of the province, Alicante is  a “sub-cathedral” which was granted to Alicante  by Pope John XXIII in 1959. With an impressive 45 metre high blue dome the cathedral  is one of the landmarks of Alicante. At one of the two entrances you will find a sculpture of the holy Nicolas done in black marble.

I think now is the best time to take a break from our traditional Alicante sightseeing tour and leave the path of historic buildings and museums. There are so many different churches, museums and places around the old city centre, that you can spend many days discovering them. However, as you visit the city during the rather hot summer months take a little step back and go up to the Plaza de C. Sotelo. 
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The city's  lovely gardens are the ideal rest place and the best starting point for a little shopping tour in Alicante.

Opposite the Plaza de C. Sotelo you will find the El Corte Ingles, the famous Spanish department store chain which has an impressive shopping selection. The building is air-conditioned, so it might just be the right place to go in order to “cool things down” a little. So after a nice “shopping-rest” as you come out of El Corte Ingles, we walk the Avenida Doctor Gadea down to the harbour area.  Next to the statue of D. Eleuterio Maisonnave, former minister of state and famous son of the city of Alicante, the Avenida guides you down to the harbour with beautiful flowers along the way.

It is this kind of small street that you constantly find all around Alicante and which makes the city such a wonderful place for a walk about. The city is full of peaceful places and gardens; its all up to you if you prefer quiet, then you will be able to find it in Alicante. As we continue down Avenida Doctor Gandea we reach the harbour area again. Before turning left and going back from where we came from, you should visit the Panoramis shopping mall at the harbour. As you go to the mall, you will pass the Real Club de Regatas – the royal regatta club. If you are lucky you might  even see members of the Spanish royal family, who sometimes spend days here.

Similar to an American style shopping mall, the Panoramis offers you a breathtaking view over Alicante harbour. With a huge variety of different restaurants, most of them with perfect views over the city, it is a lovely point of reference for any walk around the city. Finally we turn back to the area around the Melia Hotel, where we started our walk through Alicante.  Along the harbour at the Paseo Explanada de Espana our way takes us in between a row of palm trees and back to our beginning point.

Having completed more or less our walk through Alicante – which might take anywhere between 4 to 6 hours - there are obviously many more things to see and visit around this impressive city. Among others you could go up to the castle of Santa Barbara (take the car to get there if it’s too hot), see the bullfighting ring or visit the Park Ruiz de Alda which is located north of Alicante. However, you might reconsider your plans when you are actually visiting the Costa Blanca area, because above everything else is the beach, the sand and the sea.
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About the author - Robert Carlton lives with his valencian wife and daughter in the Alicante suburb of San Joan. Running a marketing company he started setting up a website for some of his international customers that visited him. You can reach him via his website http://www.alicante-spain.com

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