ALMERIA HOLIDAY IN THE SUN

Leisure Activities

The East coast of Almeria offers a wide variety of sports activities. Sea enthusiasts can enjoy diving in the rich sea beds of the bays around the Cabo de Gata, water skiing, windsurfing or boat trips on the Mediterranean.  For those who prefer mountains the area offers many routes for walking, cycling, horse riding and caves for underground exploration.  All local activities are too many and varied to list here but we have provided a few ideas below.

Club Deportivo Puerto Rey Sports & Leisure Centre

Adjacent to the Bourganvilleas roundabout in the Puerto Rey area there is a recently opened Sports & Leisure centre which offers excellent facilities for adults and children.  It has a state of the art gymnasium which can be used on a casual daily rate basis, a double height golf driving range, excellent chipping and pitching practice facilities, paddle tennis and crazy golf. All equipment can be hired at reasonable rates (see leaflets in the apartment). Downstairs there is a great café and bar with a terrace open during the day and evening. It offers a snack menu plus a very reasonably priced 3-course menu of the day.  The bar also has a pool table and dart board. Upstairs is a new restaurant, which offers both lunchtime and evening dining.

Water Park - Parque Acquatico Vera

Enjoy a fantastic day out by the beach in Vera with your family and friends.  Have fun on great water attractions; Kamikaze, multi-slides, black holes, adventure river, tube slides, wave pool, lake pool and, for the little ones, the infant pool and attractions. There is also, mini-golf, super jumper, mini-park, green zones and an amusement arcade. Situated by the beach in Vera between Garrucha and Villaricos, only a short drive from the property.

Tel:             0034 950 467337 / 950 467309

Web site:     www.ociovera.com

Email:         parque@aquavera.com

Cycling

Excellent red tarmac cycle paths are available either along the Garrucha to Villaricos main road and adjacent to the front-line promenades.  It’s possible to cycle along these routes all the way from Garrucha to Villaricos - thoroughly recommended!

For more serious cyclists or mountain bikers, there are numerous off road tracks available in the hills although these are not specifically designated cycle routes.  The supermarket next to Bar Dolar on the Pueblo Laguna road has a limited number of bikes available for hire, one with a child seat attached.  They also have a limited number of children’s bikes.  Periods of hire are available from a couple of hours up to 3 days.  A €30 refundable deposit is payable per hire.  Alternatively, there is a cycle hire shop located behind the Mercadona supermarket as you head into Garrucha town.

Go-Karting (Garrucha)

Available on the main road from Vera Playa to Mojacar as it bypasses Garrucha.  Karts for 2 drivers are available for parents and younger children on a small track or 3 sizes of karts are available on the large track.

Good value for money and great fun too!

Address:        Crta Garrucha a Turre Km 1, 04630 Garrucha

Tel:               0034 950 460 207

Web Site:       Karting Garrucha

Email:            kartinggarrucha@yahoo.es

Spaghetti Western theme parks (Tabernas)

Approximately 24 kilometres from Almeria on the N-340 is Tabernas, a village which sits between the Sierra de Alhamilla and Sierra de Filabres mountains in the only desert in Europe. Do not underestimate the summer heat - temperatures can reach 45C. Tabernas is best known for the production of spaghetti westerns and various film sets built into the desert which have been transformed into three theme parks. In its heyday, more than 100 films were partially shot here including A Fistful of Dollars, The Magnificent Seven, The Good, the Bad and the Ugly and more recently, TV adverts for Pepsi and Fiat.

Highly recommended for a full day out is Oasys, a very realistic cowboy/western themed attraction, which offers a variety of family entertainment including a zoo (lions, elephants, brown bears, giraffes, kangaroos, monkeys and other animals) and a large swimming pool with slides (open in peak season).  Visitors can also enjoy a daily mock bank hold-up and shootout staged at regular intervals.  Its safe for children, who are able to lock themselves in the jail and ‘die’ on the famous fountain, or take a ride on a cowboy’s horse or in a stagecoach.  The real cowboys are very friendly and interact well with the kids.  €18 per adult and €9 for children.

Just three kilometres away is Texas Hollywood, also used as a film set and boasting a Western town, fort, Mexican pueblo and Indian tepees.  If nothing else, stop off for a cold beer at the Western-style saloon, which is decorated with photos of some of the above screen classics starring Clint Eastwood, Charles Bronson and Raquel Welch.

Beware of Fort Bravo, another cowboy themed visitor attraction.  This is a rip-off at €48 for a family of 4 as it offers nothing but an under-developed and under-maintained movie setting.  Drive 5 kms further on to Oasys.

For further details and pictures click here

Tel:         0034 950 365263 / 0034 950 362931

Beaches

The beaches are one of the major attractions of the area and there are almost 17 kilometres of them to explore. You'll find long, un-crowded sandy beaches along the stretch of coast between Mojacar and Vera.

The beaches in the immediate vicinity consistently earn the European Blue Flag for cleanliness and offer an excellent range of activities in the peak season - jet skiing, paragliding, canoeing, water skiing, sailing, windsurfing and scuba diving.

Garrucha has a harbour beach with calm waters due to a breakwater.  There is table tennis and a children's play area with many restaurants and bars on the promenade.  Villaricos has an unspoilt golden sandy beach and an excellent beach bar.  Vera Playa has 6.8km of open clean beach and several beach bars.  About 1.5km of the beach is not for the prudish as the area is one of Europe's top naturist resorts and includes a naturist hotel!  On the coastal road south from Mojacar towards Carboneras, after about four kilometres there is a rough track which turns off towards the sea.  Follow this to discover some charming, isolated coves which pepper this stretch of the coastline.  A little further a field Cabo de Gata boasts many attractive, quiet sandy coves and beaches.

Snorkelling & Diving

There is a whole world under the Mediterranean waves just waiting to be explored. Snorkelling is something that any  swimmer can do and the relatively calm seas and gentle tides off the Almeria coast provide a perfect environment for face-down fun.

For divers, the area doesn't attract the greatest variety of species but there is still much to see and explore, particularly close to the meeting point of the Atlantic and the Mediterranean.  Dive sites provide a mix of rocky underwater landscapes, reefs and wrecks.

Marine life includes congers, groupers, seahorses, spider crabs, squid, lobster, trigger fish, sunfish and dolphins.  There are several scuba diving clubs up and down the coast.

www.scubajive.com

Viva Riva Sports

Skiing

Yes, it really is possible to ski in the Sierra Nevada in morning and sunbath on the beaches of Mojacar Playa in the afternoon!!  Spain may not conjure up an image of impressive snow covered mountain peaks but happens to have numerous ski resorts dotted throughout the country.  The Sierra Nevada defies many concepts associated with skiing.  Located about 250km from Mojacar, the popular ski resort of Pradollano is 250 kilometres from Mojacar and can be reached within a 2.5 hour drive.  It has practically guaranteed sunshine, the best spring snow conditions in Europe and is still reasonably priced compared to many of its European counterparts.  As one of Europe's highest resorts it has a surprisingly long season and traditionally opens at the end of November running through to the end of April or the first week of May.

www.sierranevada.co.uk

www.andalucia.co.uk

Local Markets

Each of the local villages host a colourful and typically Spanish local market on a different day of the week.  Some are obviously bigger and better than others but all are worth a visit.

Market days are as follows:

For further information about our Almeria apartment...

Email : almeria2rent@gmail.com

Web : www.almeria2rent.co.uk

Tel : 07887 500873