Sant Feliu de Guíxols

The fishing boats tie up at 6 am, their diesel engines cutting through the morning quiet. By half past, the first crates of mackerel and sardines are already on the quay, bought by restaurateurs who've driven down from Girona before the traffic builds. This is Sant Feliu de Guíxols at work – not a resort that happens to have boats, but a working town that happens to have visitors.

At just four metres above sea level, the place spreads along a natural bay where the hills of Baix Empordà roll straight into the Mediterranean. The monks spotted the advantage early: they've been here since the 10th century, building a Benedictine monastery whose Porta Ferrada – a pre-Romanesque gateway with horseshoe arches – still frames the sea view. Today the complex houses the town museum, but the ticket desk is tucked inside a cloister where swallows nest in the stone ribs of the ceiling. Entry is €5, and on weekday mornings you'll have the Romanesque tower largely to yourself.

The seafront promenade stretches three kilometres, linking the main beach to the smarter curve of Sant Pol. Both are urban strands, serviced and cleaned daily, yet the sand is coarse – almost gritty – so pack rubber shoes for children who insist on castle-building. In July the towels practically touch, but visit in late September and you'll share the shore with elderly locals swimming in orderly laps, their clothes neatly folded on the breakwater.

Behind the beaches, the old quarter keeps its grid of narrow lanes where washing hangs from wrought-iron balconies. Rambla Vidal, traffic-free and plane-shaded, fills with domino players after the lunch siesta. British voices are rare enough that bar staff may switch to careful English, then relax into Catalan when they realise you've mastered "Bon dia" and "Gràcies". The evening passeggiate starts around seven: grandparents, teenagers, babies in prams doing the slow circuit while the church bells mark the hours.

Food follows the sea calendar. Order suquet de peix in winter and the stew arrives thick with monkfish and potatoes; in April it lightens, scented with fresh peas. The local ganxó style of oily fish – mackerel, anchovy, sardine – is grilled over holm-oak charcoal and needs nothing more than a squeeze of lemon and the obligatory pa amb tomàquet, country bread rubbed with ripe tomato and a glug of arbequina olive oil. A three-course menú del dia runs €14–18 and usually includes wine; the smartest place on the harbour might charge €24, but you'll eat the same catch.

If you must brunch, the Sunday market along Passeig del Mar supplies empanadas stuffed with cuttlefish, and coca – a thin, pizza-like base topped with roasted aubergine and red pepper – that tastes better eaten from paper on the sea wall than in any café. Arrive before 10 am; by noon stalls are packing up and parking becomes a blood sport.

Sant Feliu makes a practical base precisely because it isn't picture-postcard perfect. The concrete 1960s apartment blocks behind Sant Pol beach are an eyesore, but they keep prices sane. A double room in June costs €80–100, half what you'll pay in up-the-road S'Agaró, yet you're 15 minutes' walk from the same crystalline coves. Driving the corniche GI-682 to Tossa de Mar is half the pleasure: pine-covered cliffs drop 200 m to turquoise inlets, and lay-bys allow vertigo-inducing photographs without risking the coach-party traffic that clogs the route north of Sant Feliu.

Walking works too. The coastal path to S'Agaró is an easy 45 minutes on paved track; continue another hour and you reach the tiny pebble beach of Sa Conca where the sand (finally fine) shelves gently and mansions hide behind cypress hedges. Serious hikers can head south towards Cala Vigatà – four hours of ups and downs, knee-high rosemary brushing your legs, the sea glittering 50 m below. Take water, a hat, and start early; there's no shade and the July sun is relentless.

Rain does happen. When the tramuntana wind blows from the Pyrenees, waves foam over the promenade and the town retreats indoors. The monastery museum, the cork-making exhibits (this was once Catalonia's bottle-stopper capital) and the warm-lit modernist Casino dels Nois suddenly feel essential. If you're still restless, Girona's medieval quarter is 30 minutes away by car, or 40 by the Sarfa bus that leaves hourly from the station on Avinguda de Catalunya.

Evenings wind down early. Bars must close by 2.30 am, and most are shuttered well before. The Porta Ferrada festival in July brings jazz, flamenco and the odd global name to the monastery cloister – Jamie Cullum played in 2022 – but tickets sell out weeks ahead. Otherwise nightlife is a gin-tonic on the yacht-club terrace, watching masts sway against a sky that fades from salmon to violet. For something louder you'll need Lloret, 25 minutes up the coast, though the crowd there is precisely what Sant Feliu regulars come here to avoid.

Come late May or mid-September. Temperatures sit in the low 20s, the sea is warm enough for proper swimming, and hoteliers still greet guests like long-lost cousins rather than necessary August units. Parking meters sleep, restaurant tables aren't claimed by 8 pm, and the fishing boats still have space to manoeuvre. The Costa Brava has showier bays, chicer hotels, finer sand. Sant Feliu offers something harder to package: the sense that Spain continues around you, not for you.