After simple breakfast at Pensión El Pirineo I persuaded the others now to join me on a voyage of personal nostalgia and rediscovery. I visited this part of Spain forty years ago when I went on a two week holiday to Benidorm and I thought it might be fun to revisit the places that I had seen in 1977.
First we went to Guadalest (picture above, 1977) a small mountain village with a castle which is a short bus trip drive out of Benidorm and a day trip that I took all those years ago. It hadn’t really changed a great deal, except it had had a few coats of fresh paint and the local ladies selling genuine lace products had been replaced by tourist shops selling junk.
We stopped for lunch and a walk around the narrow streets but it was much smaller than I remembered and it didn’t take long to refresh my memories and soon we were on the road into Benidorm.
Mick wasn’t looking forward to this at all, I think it is quite low down on his list of places to visit in Spain but I was really happy to be revisiting the place that I had hated in 1977 and Mick hates in 2017.
Back then we could have gone practically anywhere we liked, so long as it was within our restricted budget of course, but we choose to go to Benidorm on the Costa Blanca for two whole weeks and we selected the Don Juan hotel on Calle Gerona, just behind the Levante beach because my girlfriend, Linda (later my wife) had been there some time before with her parents and had liked it.
Iglesia de San Jaime y Santa Ana near the Balcón del Mediterráneo in 1977..
And again in 2017…
Benidorm is one of the most popular tourist locations in Europe, today six million people go there each year on holiday but in 1977 it was even more popular and that year attracted the most holidaymakers ever and over twelve million people poured into the city. That peak in numbers has never been matched since and it is unlikely that it ever will be.
Arriving in Benidorm we left the motorway and found an underground car park with surprising ease (underground car parks are always empty in Spain because the Spanish refuse to pay parking fees) and with the anticipation of severe culture shock rising to near boiling point we made straight for the old town.
Almost immediately it was a huge let down. We had been expecting tat shops and British pubs, the distinctive smell of Hawaiian tropic, fat bellied lager louts with tattoos and peroxide Essex blondes with fake designer sunglasses and massive boob-jobs but there was none of that sort of thing at all. No rampaging bands of tourist hooligans just a pensioner choir singing on the beach.
It was a very a very civilised affair with predominantly elderly Spanish people sedately enjoying the sun and a few British left-over’s from the winter Saga tours where the length of stay could be measured directly in degrees of orange tan. Not even any ‘looky-looky’ men to pester us!
I have to say that Benidorm in 2017 was nothing like what I was anticipating at all but was really rather pleasant and the beaches were immense and spectacular with beautiful clean sand and blue flags flapping proudly in the breeze. It is an interesting fact that Spain has more blue flag beaches than any other participating country with five hundred and eleven in five thousand kilometres of coastline, the United Kingdom by comparison, has only one hundred and twenty-five in nearly eighteen thousand kilometres.
Balcón del Mediterráneo in 1977…
In the old town itself there were more Spanish tapas bars than British pubs and there was a notable absence of those awful places with tacky pictures of the food on the menu. There was not a bit of it and after wandering around the old town searching unsuccessfully for cheap souvenir shops we had to finally admit defeat and sit in a bar on the seafront and have the first beer of the day.
If Benidorm was a surprisingly nice place then the old town was an especially nice place with a blue domed church, reminiscent of those in the Greek islands, and a pedestrianised area that was positively delightful. I remembered this from my visit forty years ago but not much else I have to say and with refreshment time over we walked a short way along the Levante in search of what we were sure was the real Benidorm from the television series but without success we called a halt to the expedition and retraced our steps back to the car.
Although we were disappointed not to see what we had come for it was a pleasant surprise and we left with the confirmation that despite the tourists that flock in every summer that Benidorm is a very real Spanish town, with Spanish culture and a Spanish history of tuna fishermen and merchant sailors that was actually quite plain to see.
I wished that I had grasped that in 1977 because if I had then I am sure that I would have enjoyed it more then.
I love the comparison pictures. It looks like a lovely city. I might have to put it on my list for my next visit to Spain.
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I like Benidorm, it is much better than its reputation. Thanks for stopping by.
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Wawww it’s a beautiful city… Loved the pictures 👍
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Benidorm does have a certain alternative beauty!
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It’s a beautiful coastline, Andrew. The backdrop on that Balcon shot proves it. I have friends who go every year, and they could afford to go somewhere else if they chose. 🙂
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I like Benidorm and there is a great coastal railway that goes in both directions so it is easy to get all along the coast quite cheaply!
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I love those flares!
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Thank goodness that they went quickly out of fashion.
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Well, what a surprise – not what I would have expected…..
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A nice place and well worth a visit!
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Benidorm is new to me and it looks lovely. Even better, no ‘looky-looky’ men, unless that’s what you’re looking for.
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No, they are a nuisance and the place is better without them!
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A very interesting post Andrew comparing places with photos from two eras in your life. Something I did recently comparing Kathmandu of 1983 with 2016, though sadly no personal photos from ’83. On a train entering Buffalo US st the moment but looking forward to getting home and using your cheap flights idea.
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I hope you have had a good trip, is it really time to return home already?
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Not quite, today at Niagara Falls, then Amtrak tomorrow to NYC for three nights. By the way I liked your 7 Wonders article and would like to reblog it when I get home if that’s ok?
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Thanks, yes and enjoy NYC!
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Hi Andrew. Fund story. I love the pictures from way back when, especially those bell-bottoms and the shag haircut. Will anyone ever be as cool as we were back then? I’m just fresh back from my trip to Egypt and there are changes in my life once again, so I’m hoping to get back on the blog wagon more faithfully. I’ve been missing your posts!
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Seventies style – lets hope it never comes back! Hope you had a good trip, will we be reading about it?
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Absolutely, first installment published yesterday!
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You have dropped out of my reader. Sorted now. I don’t understand WordPress sometimes!
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Probably had to do with the fact that I have been a pretty sporadic blogger over the past few months.
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Back on now.
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Make that fun story!
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Quite the head of hair there, Andrew! 🙂 I enjoyed the comparisons. It looks like a good place to visit from the photos. They have obviously put a lot of work into upgrading the town but it seems to fit. –Curt
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Some people are lobbying for it to be awarded World Heritage Site status!
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Andrew I absolutely love the ‘before and after’ photos and descriptions. Well you haven’t changed a bit. Well maybe just a little. No more bell bottom trousers. Perhaps best of all the pleasant surprise of things not so different as you imagined.
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I couldn’t take those jeans on a plane these days, they would use up all my baggage allowance!
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Haha isn’t that the truth!
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I lived and worked in Benidorm for 6 years in the 70’s and then went on to work in other areas of Spain as a tour rep I do get rather annoyed when people only think of Benidorm as a boozy British resort When I worked there I made the choice of embracing the Spanish culture and I could think of nothing worse than sitting in a British pub , why would you do that when you can have a nice glass of Rioja and tapas ???
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Exactly. Sadly this is the Brit view of Benidorm however unfair that is, Thank you for adding this!
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You’ll know from past comments that I like Benidorm having first visited it in 1959 before the crowds, so I sort of grew with it. We used to rent a flat on the Balcón del Mediterráneo (opposite where you are standing in the photos) which had a massive balcony, 4 bedrooms, kitchen and living-room, for next to nothing. We lived like kings there for 4 weeks at a time during October for about four years in all although we never came to grips with the Spanish cooker. Great days, flares and all.
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Thank you Mari, I am a very big fan of Benidorm.
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