The south area of Costa Blanca stretches from Alicante along the Spanish Mediterranean coastline, towards the southern city of Cartagena. Important areas along the way are Santa Pola, Guardamar del Segura, Torrevieja and Mar Menor. Santa Pola is a tourist municipality with the most important fishing fleet in the Spanish Mediterranean. The first settlers there inhabited the “Cueva de las Arañas” (the cave of spiders) in the third and fourth Millennium BC, and in the first century AD., with the arrival of the Romans, the area became known as “Portus Illicitanus”, developing into one of the key ports for maritime commerce.

Guardamar is a popular resort with impressive beaches and open spaces. A beautiful landscape of sand dunes contributes to making it a desirable tourist destination. The town is situated in an area that has yielded the remains of Phoenician and Iberian settlements. The river Segura divides the territory into two zones. The municipality had to be completely rebuilt from nothing, after being destroyed by an earthquake. Today it presents a dozen kilometres of beaches covered with sand dunes and fringed by pine, eucalyptus and palm trees.


Amongst lagoons, on a great plain, Torrevieja is located, a destination of great importance. The coastline of Torrevieja is full of sandy spots inserted in-between the cliffs and the coves. The numerous beaches give the zone a Mediterranean style which together with the exceptional climate turn Torrevieja into a nature paradise. The current municipality grew next to a tower (Torre), the old one (la Vieja), which gave it its name along with some natural characteristics that have marked its history and its daily life.

The local microclimate is a particularly healthy one and has been recommended by medical specialists the world over. The area boasts some splendid beaches, with which it has developed its tourist capacity in combination with its seafaring and salt-making tradition. Today, it is one of the main European producers of salt. Torrevieja also offers lively entertainment, like the famous Cuban dances and its International contest which celebrates the “Torrevejeneses” that traded with Cuba, colony from which they brought these melodies.

Next is the Mar Menor, a saltwater lagoon separated from the Mediterranean by a 30km stretch of land called La Manga. The 170 kms² of the Mar Menor is often called 'The Largest Swimming Pool in the World' because, being separated, it has higher temperatures than the Mediterranean, calmer waters and high levels of salts - thought to have beneficial qualities. The sea temperature fluctuates between 17°C in winter and 23°C in summer.

In the north of the Mar Menor is Lo Pagán which is famous for it's causeway containing healthy grey and black mud baths which attract many visitors from across Europe. People suffering from rheumatism and arthritis come to smear their bodies to alleviate their pain.The salt dunes form a shelter for the nature reserve where there are more than a hundred species of birds, including many flamingos.