Benidorm, A Day Trip, With A Mexican Lunch Included

It’s funny, we live within 30 minutes of one of the Costa Blanca’s top tourist destinations yet we rarely ever visit it. When I was a kid and we had family or friends staying, Benidorm would be a guaranteed outing. We’d go via the scenic route, over the Coll de Rates, through Tárbena and Callosa, eventually ending up at the seaside resort. Luckily our guests would visit out of season, if they’d have come in the summer months I doubt we’d have even contemplated venturing there.

Nowadays it seems we only go if we have to (a doctor’s appointment, a gig, meeting friends who are staying there, etc, etc,) but rarely do we go to do a spot of sightseeing. I think the last time I went for more than a couple of hours was in 2013, to the Low Cost Festival (now known as Low Festival). Apart from a couple of trips to the beach, most of our time was spent sleeping or inside the festival grounds. It can’t really be classed as a Benidorm excursion.

But a couple of Sundays ago that was all about to change 😁. We had so enjoyed our train trip to Altea and Albir (post here), we decided to use the services again, this time venturing to the world-famous coastal town. Return tickets from Benissa cost 4.25€ each. You have to change trains in Alfaz del Pi. Our chosen destination was the Benidorm Intermodal Station. If we’d have continued to the other Benidorm station, the original one, we’d have had to do another changeover.

Our first stop was the Mirador de la Cruz. It’s perched atop the Serra Gelada and offers fantastic views of Benidorm and also the surrounding mountains. It took us about an hour to walk there from the station. The last 30 minutes or so are uphill but nothing too drastic. The walk is on paths or tarmac until just before you reach the cross. Unfortunately the day was rapidly becoming overcast, (not more rain, surely?!?!), so we didn’t fully benefit from what would normally be stupendous views. But you can get the gist.

As always, all that walking opens our appetites. I’d booked a table in a Mexican restaurant which sits back a few hundred metres from the Levante beach. We love a good Mexican (restaurant 😁) and finding one that offers decent food in this area isn’t the easiest of tasks. For my 40th birthday a few years back, Pep and I had a fantastic holiday in New Orleans. The only thing we weren’t too keen on was the local cuisine. I think we were unlucky, being such a touristy city it’s easy to wind up in the wrong establishments. Thankfully there were some excellent Mexican restaurants which managed to keep us extremely full during our stay. They really were fantabulous and we miss them greatly (especially, in my case at least, the pineapple and coriander margaritas they serve 😊).

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The “Molí Del Quisi” Walking Route (Benissa) And A Take-Away “Arròs Del Senyoret”

This has caused us a slight problem though. Every Mexican restaurant we’ve been to thereafter has been compared to those Orleanian eateries. Unfortunately we’ve been disappointed most of the time, although there have been 3 or 4 exceptions. Restaurante Mexikal (website here) is one of those exceptions, which we were rather pleased about seeing as we were a tad peckish. After a 45 minute walk back down from the “Mirador” and along the Levante beach, we were quite famished and looking forward to our late lunch.

The food certainly didn’t disappoint, nor did the service. Here’s a few pics of our food, and also my frozen tamarind margarita. I rarely drink. Most people say they have the odd glass of wine or beer. I say I like to enjoy the odd margarita. By odd I mean about 2 a year 😂. I took advantage of the fact that we’d come on the train and sampled one of their delicious cocktails. The barman suggested I try a type of not too hot chilli powder on the rim, the contrast with the tamarind supposedly works very well. I like it with salt usually so he did half and half. The spicy half was delicious.

Whether food in Mexico is similar to this I have no idea (I would love to visit one day and find out), all I know is it was almost as good as the Mexican food we sampled in New Orleans and we’ll no doubt return on our next trip to Benidorm.

We didn’t have dessert, we thought we’d have a stroll around the old town first. We’d only been walking for a few minutes when we came across one of our favourite ice cream parlours. Amorino (website here) is a franchise but an incredibly good one. We never go to food franchises but we make an exception when it comes to this one. Their gelato is wonderful, as are their sorbets. Some of the flavours are eco too. You can have as many flavours as you want, even in the small cone or tub. If you ask for the cone they make the ice cream look like a rose. Beautiful.

We visited Amorino the first time in Valencia a few years back (there are two there). They also opened in the Ondara shopping centre 3 or so years ago but it’s been closed due to the Covid situation (unfortunately). I had no idea there was one in Benidorm until our recent trip, another good excuse to visit again soon 😊.

Just as we were finishing our ice creams it started to rain. April has been incredibly wet, even Benidorm’s microclimate didn’t escape a downpour whilst we were there. We quickly bought a brolly and found a bar to enjoy a cup of coffee, sheltering under their awning. The atmosphere in the old town was lively, everyone was enjoying their last drinks inside the bars and restaurants, before they have to close at 6. It seemed so odd that their fun would abruptly come to an end. Sunday afternoon/evening drinks tend to last until dark, making the most of the last few hours of the weekend.

The rain didn’t last long so we continued our walk round the old town and to the Balcón del Mediterráneo, a construction of “terraces” perched on a small, rocky cliff, that separates the Levante and Poniente beaches. We visited many a time when I was a child, bringing all our visitors so they could observe views of the town’s skyline. Pep surprised me when he said he’d never been. I think our first few years in Spain we were more like holidaymakers than residents, touring the countryside and always eager to find new places. In fact, things haven’t really changed, I still enjoy exploring this area of the world we call home. I think I’ve turned Pep into a tourist too 😊.

We had a stroll along the Poniente beach before slowly walking back to the train station via the Parc de l’Aigüera, a pretty park that’s worth wandering through, especially since the weather had cheered up.

Benidorm gets some bad rap, largely due to us Brits, also because it’s a concrete jungle. But if you can avoid going in the summer months it certainly has its charm. I’ve always liked it, especially the old town, and if you know which parts to avoid it’s possible you’ll forget it has the reputation it does.

Well, that was our day gallivanting about Benidorm. The train takes just over 50 minutes from Benissa to the Benidorm Intermodal station. It’s such a lovely train journey, the time passes very quickly. For timetables and more info check out the Tram website here. It should be in English, if it’s not there is an option to change the language.

One more thing before I go 😁. Pep had been trying for a few weeks to book a table at one of our favourite restaurants. Each time he remembered to ring they were fully booked for the day he wanted to go. Eventually he managed to book a table for last Sunday. I’ve spoken about the Restaurante Cantonet in Calpe on this post here and also here (and possibly in other posts too, we really love it). Their rice dishes are fantastic and the menu is very good value for money.

We tootled on down to Calpe about an hour before our reservation. Parking close to the Calpe salt lakes we noticed there was a wee bridge that leads to a short walk around the “Salinas”. We’ve driven by the area thousands of times and had never noticed it 🙄. Instead of walking along the front like we normally do we thought we’d investigate this new found walk. It’s not too long but it’s definitely worth having a meander around.

And now a few photos of our meal 😁. The menu consists of 3 starters, main course, dessert and bread (no all-i-oli, but believe me, you won’t miss it. It’s often best to skip the bread too, there’s so much food). There are various different rice dishes or fideuà to choose from, also a fish or meat option. We nearly always have the arroz señoret and I swear it gets better every time. How they do this I don’t know, each time we eat it we think it surely can’t be improved upon.

The desserts are also tremendous and very decadent, they’re constantly changing them too. This is great but sometimes I wish the lemon meringue tart I spoke about in the aforementioned posts was back on the menu. Still, I made the effort and sampled the pistachio and strawberry tart with homemade butter pastry. It’s a dirty job but someone’s got to do it 😂

I think you’ll agree, for 20,90€ (plus drinks) it’s well worth giving this restaurant a go, we have yet to have a bad meal and we’ve been quite a few times. I think we can safely say, for Spanish cuisine, it’s our favourite restaurant in the area. In fact, for any cuisine, it’s hard to beat. The service has always been brilliant, the owner is friendly, helpful and always has a smile on her face to greet you. We’re lucky to have it so close by.

Alright my dears, that’s enough for today. Going to enjoy a spot more rain by the looks of it. Great 🙄. I’ll be back on Valley FM today around lunchtime. Here’s the link to last week’s spot if you fancy a listen, I’m on just after the half way mark. As always, any suggestions or questions or whatever you fancy, feel free to get in touch, we love to hear from you all.

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