The beach at the end of Europe

Harry Glass finds tranquillity, history, nature and tough planning laws on Spain’s Costa de la Luz

From the verandah of a beach café we could see people way down along the beach, but much closer were the animals in front of the balcony – horses, their heads down, nibbling on a patch of grass, and cows staring out to sea.

It was a scene of utter tranquillity, and an illustration of how unspoiled one of Spain’s prettiest coastlines remains.

This was Bolonia on the Costa de la Luz, which takes over from the Costa del Sol at Tarifa – the southern-most tip of mainland Europe – and extends to the Portuguese border.

The River Guadalquivir runs through its middle, creating the two provinces of Cadiz and Huelva. Sun, sand and surf are the building blocks of good summer holidays, and both of these regions have plenty of each.

View from Vejer de la Frontera

This Atlantic coastline doesn’t have sea temperatures to match the Med’s, but its sands are fine and its towns would disappoint holidaymakers wanting English pubs and caffs. For this reason and others, come vacation time, the Spanish choose the 260-mile Costa de la Luz over the others.

Thanks to the numerous protected parkland areas along the coast – including Doñana, the largest wildlife reserve in Europe – and strict planning and building laws, the costa is a high-rise-free zone.

We arrived at our villa outside Conil de la Frontera at around midnight, having taken the obligatory wrong turns, and were desperately hungry. We drove back into town, saw people leaving a tapas bar, and dashed in. “What time are you open till?” I asked in Spanish.

“One, one-thirty,” the barman said, as if he was deciding when to go to bed.

Houses facing the sea in Conil

He poured us a couple of cool cervezas, we ordered seafood salads and bread with boquerones – anchovies – and our frustrations quickly vanished with the booze.

Conil de la Frontera is roughly an hour’s drive from Jerez airport, halfway down the N340 road which runs south east along the coast to Tarifa. This is my kind of dual carriageway – every sliproad leads to another seaside town, village, or secluded beach. Chiclana, Canos de Meca, Barbate and Zahara de los Atunes are four of the larger stops, the latter a sleepy tuna fishing port which Cervantes – author of Don Quixote – satirised in his story The Illustrious Kitchen Maid.