Roquetas de Mar

The approach road gives the game away. Forty minutes east of Almería airport the landscape turns silver-white: a shimmering lattice of plastic sheeting that supplies most of Europe’s winter tomatoes. It looks lunar, smells faintly of fertiliser, and explains why Roquetas de Mar logs 3,000 hours of sunshine a year. Then the road crests a low rise and the sheets stop dead at the beach. Suddenly you’re on a 14-kilometre sand ribbon, backed by a promenade so long locals measure evening walks by the kilometre rather than the minute.

Sea first, everything else second

Roquetas began as a fishing hamlet huddled round an 18th-century castle built to see off Berber pirates. The castle is still there—stone walls, small museum, free entry on Tuesdays—but the harbour now fills with cabin cruisers rather than trawlers. Mornings, the auction hall behind the marina sells red prawns landed at dawn; by late afternoon the same quayside turns into a gin-and-tonic terrace where Spanish families argue over football while their children chase feral cats between the moorings.

The beach itself is the resort’s main monument. Playa Serena, the middle section, has the highest density of hotels yet still feels uncrowded outside July–August. The sand is flat, firm and wide enough for a full-size football pitch at low tide; the water shelves gently, so toddlers can paddle without parents ageing ten years. A dedicated cycle lane shadows the prom from end to end—hire a bike at the kiosk opposite Hotel Playaluna (€12 half-day) and you can freewheel 7 km south to the quieter end at Playa de la Bajadilla, where apartment blocks give way to salt flats and the odd windsurfer.

What the brochures don’t mention

Spanish school holidays turn the town into a giant family reunion. From mid-July to the end of August every apartment seems to contain three generations and a paella pan; the seafront car park charges €2 an hour and you’ll queue 20 minutes for ice-cream. Come in late May or mid-September instead and the same cafés spread their tables across the pavement without the stroller gridlock.

The other seasonal hazard is the levante, an easterly wind that can whip sand against your shins like bird-shot. It usually lasts a day, then drops as suddenly as it rose. Locals regard it as free exfoliation; British shoulders tend to disagree, so pack a light long-sleeve shirt even in August.

Salt, feathers and free tapas

Behind the beach lies one of Andalucía’s least-known wetlands. The Salinas de Roquetas are shallow lagoons where Romans once scraped salt and flamingos now stop to refuel between Africa and the Camargue. A 2 km boardwalk loops through the reserve; bring binoculars and you’ll see avocets, stilts and, if the water level is right, a rose-pink line of phoenicopterus ruber. Interpretation boards are in Spanish only, but the birds speak universal grammar. The wind here is unfiltered—sun-hat essential, insect repellent useful on still mornings.

Back in town, the Thursday street market sprawls across Avenida de la Unión Europea until 14:00. Fruit stalls sell mangoes the size of cricket balls for €2 a kilo; a leather handbag that would cost £45 in Almería’s shopping centre drops to €25 if you haggle in Spanish numbers. Arrive before 11:00 or the shade disappears and the pavement radiates like a pizza oven.

Lunch options fall into two camps: beach-front chiringuitos with English menus and city prices, or the back-street bars where builders sit at high tables at 15:30. Follow the plasterers. Order a caña (small beer, €1.80) in Bar La Huella on Calle San Roque and you’ll receive a plate of grilled squid rings without asking. Order a second drink and the plate becomes migas—fried breadcrumbs laced with chorizo and tiny clams. By the third you’ve had a full meal for under six euros and the landlord is explaining why Almería’s football team will never make La Liga again.

Day-trip calculus

Roquetas markets itself as a base for excursions, which is half-true. Almería city is 35 minutes on the hourly bus (€2.10, pay the driver). The Alcazaba fortress looms above tapas bars where prawns still arrive head-on and nobody mentions Taylor Swift. In the other direction, the Cabo de Gata coastal park offers volcanic coves and water the colour of Bombay Sapphire, but you’ll need a car or an organised tour—public transport stops at the frontier of the plastic sea.

Closer, and easier without wheels, is the mini-desert of Tabernas. Sergio Leone shot A Fistful of Dollars among its badlands; today you can watch a canned stunt show or simply enjoy the surreal sight of cactus and tumbleweed 25 minutes from a beach resort. Entry to the western set is €26, which feels steep until you remember that the Peak District charges £12 for parking.

When the sun clocks off

Evenings start late. At 20:00 the promenade is still a furnace; by 22:00 it becomes an outdoor living room. Grandparents perch on folding stools, toddlers career between roller-bladers, and someone’s uncle is inevitably tuning a guitar. The ice-cream parlour at the marina does a decent pistachio; the cocktail shack next door adds rum to anything for an extra euro. If you want something more structured, the castle courtyard hosts flamenco Fridays in July (free, plastic chairs, bring your own cushion).

Fireworks mark the feast of Virgen del Carmen on 16 July. A statue of the patron saint is carried from the church, loaded onto a trawler, and escorted round the bay by anything that floats. From the breakwater it looks like a naval invasion organised by your local Rotary Club. The procession ends with a firework display reflected in the water and a street party that keeps half of Roquetas awake until the first prawns of dawn hit the auction floor.

Bottom line

Roquetas de Mar will never win Spain’s prettiest-village prize. The skyline is a Lego set of white blocks, and the inland view remains stubbornly agricultural. What it offers instead is space, sunshine and a Spanish soundtrack that hasn’t been remastered for British hen parties. Bring a bike, an appetite and realistic expectations: this is a working town that happens to own a superb beach, not the other way round. If that sounds like your sort of compromise, the plastic-greenhouse approach road is the price worth paying.