Playa Chica

Its purpose lies elsewhere. Playa Chica is the swimming beach of the Tarifeña families, the most accessible snorkelling corner in the area (rocky bottom, octopus, salema, sometimes shoals of barracuda in summer). The water is strangely warmer than on the Atlantic coast, and clearer still when the levante blows hard on the other side of the isthmus: the wind passes overhead without touching the sea.

For SUP paddlers and swimmers, Playa Chica is also the ideal starting point to watch the colonies of cormorants and Audouin's gulls around the Isla de las Palomas. At low tide you can almost walk across to the western rocks, where anglers try their luck with white seabream and gilt-head bream.

The atmosphere is resolutely local and family-oriented, with the view of Africa 14 km away that seems within arm's reach. This is the flip side of Los Lances: no kite, no music, just the quiet breathing of the Strait.