Avilés

The first thing you notice is the sound of cider hitting glass from shoulder height. It happens every thirty seconds inside the stone-flagged bars under the arcades of Calle Galiana, a noise like a brief summer cloudburst trapped indoors. Outside, the same evening light that would bleach southern Spain to white gold here turns the 17th-century soportales a soft Atlantic grey, the colour of Welsh slate. You’re forty minutes’ bus ride from Oviedo, yet Avilés feels closer to Cardiff than to Seville – and that, for many British visitors, is the appeal.

A Town That Faces the Water, Not the Camera

Most guidebooks send travellers to the “historic quarter” as if it were a garnish on a plate of coast and cranes. In Avilés the garnish is the meal. Start in Plaza de España: arcaded on three sides, café tables angled towards the bandstand, locals arguing over the lottery at 11 a.m. sharp. The square is compact – you can cross it in 90 seconds – but the proportions are perfect, which is why Spaniards keep voting it onto their own “most beautiful” lists even though hardly any foreigners have heard of it.

From the square every street spills north towards the estuary. Follow Rivero and you walk under continuous stone shelter; when the inevitable Asturian shower arrives you won’t feel a drop. Peek into the doorways: ironmongers that have sold nails since 1890, a bakery whose window displays a single loaf the size of a steering wheel, a tiny shop selling only handmade clogs. These are not heritage props; they open at eight and close for lunch, just as they did before cruise ships began tying up downstream.

Five minutes’ walk brings you to the Parque del Muelle, once the commercial jetty, now lawns and cranes in the same frame. The tide smells of diesel and seaweed in equal measure – the authentic perfume of a working estuary. Locals roller-skate past while bulk carriers load zinc slabs on the opposite bank. Few Spanish towns let you stand so close to both medieval masonry and 40-ton cargo hooks without paying an entrance fee.

The Building That Doesn’t Belong – and Therefore Does

Carry on another ten minutes and the Centro Niemeyer appears like a white concrete UFO that has landed on a brownfield. Oscar Niemeyer’s only work in Spain – a plaza-cum-auditorium shaped like a wave and a periscope – divides opinion. Some residents call it “the peanut” and complain the money should have gone to repair fishing boats. Others book tickets for Brazilian jazz precisely because they can watch the sun set over the cranes through a curved window taller than a double-decker bus.

The centre is at its best when you treat it as a belvedere rather than a destination. Arrive an hour before closing, climb the external ramp and watch the sky turn the same colour as the pre-dinner gin and tonics being poured on the terrace below. Exhibitions open and shut without warning; check online the morning you visit or simply come for the panorama and the £2.50 coffee – still cheaper than anything with a view in Brighton.

What to Eat Between Showers

Galician rain keeps the grass green and the appetite sharp. Avilés answers with plates designed for shipyard workers: cachopo, two veal steaks glued together with Serrano ham and cheese, then breadcrumbed and fried until the edges resemble a Cornish pasty. One portion feeds two; ask for it to be sliced in the kitchen or you’ll end up performing surgery at table. Pair it with sidra, the local cider that must be poured from above the head to aerate, then drunk in one gulp. The ritual looks theatrical until you realise it’s the only way the stuff tastes of anything other than faintly fizzy vinegar.

If that sounds like hard work, order fabada, a bean and chorizo stew milder than cassoulet but just as comforting on a drizzly April afternoon. Tierra Astur on Calle Galiana keeps English menus by the till and staff who will demonstrate the cider pour without smirking at your attempts. Finish with arroz con leche, rice pudding thick enough to hold a spoon upright, dusted with cinnamon that smells like Christmas in Middlesbrough.

When the Sun Comes Out, Head Sideways

The council’s own coastline is industrial, but Salinas beach sits just inside the next municipality, fifteen minutes on the Línea 1 bus for £1.20. The sand is pale gold, the Atlantic brisk enough to remind you of Bournemouth in March. On summer weekends Spanish families arrive with cool-boxes and badminton sets; mid-week in October you’ll share the promenade with retired fishermen mending nets and the occasional jogger breathing steam. No beach clubs, no inflatables salesman, just a long curve and a café that does excellent grilled sardines for £6 a portion.

Back in town, the same weather that empties the beach sharpens the light on the stone. Photographers should aim for 6 p.m. in May: the façades glow butter-yellow while storm clouds stack out to sea like layered slate. Bring a waterproof jacket; the shower will arrive on cue five minutes later.

Practicalities Without the Bullet Points

Asturias airport is 25 minutes away by half-hourly bus (£2.50 exact change only). Taxis charge a flat €25, still cheaper than missing the last cider pour. The old centre is flat, cobbled and mostly pedestrian; wheelcases rattle, so pack a backpack if you’re staying in a pensión without a lift. Most accommodation clusters around Plaza de España – expect £65 for a double in a converted mansion with breakfast, less if you wander one street back.

Shutters still come down between 2 p.m. and 5 p.m.; eat lunch at 1 p.m. or you’ll queue with cruise-ship passengers who dock at 11 and leave at four. Evening meals start at nine, but cider bars will serve tortilla and cheese plates from six if you look hungry enough. Sunday is genuinely dead – even the newsagents close – so treat it as a travel day or book dinner before Saturday midnight.

Rain is possible in every month; July simply means the downpour is warm. A lightweight mac beats an umbrella, which the wind off the estuary will invert within seconds. English is spoken in the Niemeyer and the Parador, nowhere else. Learn three phrases: “Un culín, por favor” (a small cider), “¿Hay cachopo para uno?” (is the veal dish available solo?), and “La cuenta, cuando pueda” (the bill, when you can). The effort earns a nod and often a free chupito of herbal liqueur that tastes like cough mixture and works surprisingly well.

Leaving Without the Souvenir Tea-Towel

Avilés will never compete with the postcard perfection of coastal Cantabria or the pinchos buzz of San Sebastián. That is precisely why you might choose it as a two-night stop between flights, or as a base for rainy-day excursions to Oviedo’s pre-Romanesque churches. Come for the arcades, the cider acoustics and the sight of a medieval town that still clocks in for a shift at the port. Leave before you run out of things to do – three days is plenty – but don’t be surprised if the smell of diesel mixed with apple ferment follows you home, prompting an urge to pour your next drink from waist height and wonder why nowhere back home sounds quite like a northern Spanish shower trapped in a glass.