Summer is coming and we are already thinking about our vacation destination. Do we like the sea, sunbathing and beach life? Then in Spain There are many options and we will talk about one of them today: Sea Tower.
This coastal town is In Andalucia and it has a millenary history so you can combine a typical beach and sea vacation with history.
Torre del Mar
As we said above is in the autonomous community of Andalusia, in the province of Malaga, along the coast, combining the sea with the mountains. This on the shores of the Mediterranean, at very low altitude, and obviously it is part of the Costa del Sol.
The Phoenicians and Greeks have been around here and the same Romans. Later the Arabs and due to its coastal location, the town has always been under the threat of piracy and invasions. The current urban form was taken only during the XNUMXth century, with its four beautiful neighborhoods: the Castillo neighborhood, the New Houses, the Viña neighborhood and the Parroquia neighborhood.
At the beginning of the XNUMXth century, several spas were built but only after the Second World War, already in the 60s, tourism took hold in Torre del Mar as a lucrative activity. There the rental houses, the buildings, the commercial premises, the promenade and others appeared.
Visit Torre del Mar
Let's start with the most obvious thing that Torre del Mar offers us: beaches and sea. The main beach is about two thousand meters long and it has all the services we need. It is a beach Blue flagFurthermore, and the Institute for Tourist Quality has also awarded it the Q classification for quality.
It is on this beautiful and wide beach that the promenade, which completes the summer postcard. Recently a children's area has even been built with slides, seesaws and swings that the little ones can use when they get tired of jumping waves.
The beach has a cafeteria and restaurant, free parking and ramps for people with disabilities. Another destination to visit on the coast are headlights. Yes, they are two lighthouses that are in the town and that show that the coast has had different levels over time.
The first lighthouse is the light blue and white one, painted in stripes. It is a lighthouse for maritime traffic, electric, automatic and that is turned on with the help of a photoelectric cell. It is 26 meters high and is located at an altitude of 29 meters on the promenade.
The second lighthouse is not easy to find if you don't know where to look for it. It was built in 1864 and has also changed location. It has been in the same place since 1929 but as the town began to grow and become more urbanized, the lighthouse remained hidden among the buildings. Look for it at the end of Avenida Toré Toré, on the left hand side, a hundred meters from the first.
But we said that Torre del Mar has other things to offer us, beyond the sun and the sea. Let's start with the historical buildings. The first of them has to do with the remains of the ancient castle of Torre del Mar. It was a fortress castle, a coastal bastion, small and with functions of surveillance of the coast. The current form is acquired thanks to reforms in 1730, with its two towers, curtains and battery.
There is also the farmhouse Vineyard House, a centenary site at the foot of Monte de la Viña, with a beautiful square central patio, a three-storey pavilion with hipped tiles and windows with bars. The Torre del Mar Train Station It is also a small jewel from the beginning of the XNUMXth century, with bricks, neo-Mudejar style and green glazed tiles.
In religious matters there are the remains of an old hermitage, the so-called hermitage of anguish, erected by Pedro González. Only the Baroque-style façade with stone ashlars, the pilasters and the capital remains. Formerly the hermitage was all on the side of the houses that exist today, but it disappeared at the beginning of the XNUMXth century when the houses were built. The Larios House is a late XNUMXth century house and integrates the sugar mill in the area.
The house served as offices and housing of the engineer and its glazed tiles, its iron columns, the sevillian tiles and the image of the Virgin of the Immaculate Conception. Sugar production began here at the end of the 90th century, but in the middle of the following century the factory took the form of a Cuban sugar mill with a steam engine included. It did not go very well and the Larios family bought it and dedicated themselves to its exploitation until the XNUMXs of the XNUMXth century. Today the complex of sugar buildings is the heritage of Torre del Mar and can be visited.
Another interesting house is Villa Mercedes, on the Paseo Larios. Before this type of regionalist houses were surrounded by a wall so we see a very typical architectural style. It has two floors, a tower, a porch with a stucco frieze, a balcony, wrought iron windows and a tower. It is an elegant house, typical of the late XNUMXth and early XNUMXth centuries. The same is the current Tourist Office that works in the so-called Casa Recreo, from the late nineteenth century.
But beyond the beach, the sea and the historical sites of the locality here too there are many popular festivals. Between June and July, for example, hand in hand with summer, there is the Saint John festivity (on 24/6), Las Melosas festivities (15 and 16/7), the Feast of the Virgen del Carmen, patron saint of fishermen (16/7), and the Feast of Santiago and Santa Ana (from 11 to 26/7).
Finally, How do you get to Torre del Mar? By bus from Malaga or from Nerja.