Isla de Tabarca
Just 11 nautical miles south of Alicante lies Tabarca, Spain's smallest permanently inhabited island and the country's first marine reserve, established in 1986. Its 18th-century walled village, crystalline waters in a dozen shades of turquoise and near-total absence of motor vehicles make it feel like a different century — reachable in 45 minutes by ferry from the Explanada de España.
The island and its history
Tabarca was repopulated in 1769 by King Carlos III with Genoese fishermen freed from Tunisian captivity — their Italian surnames (Martínez, Parodi, Ferro) still appear on the island today. The walled town, barely 300 metres long, contains a baroque church (San Pedro y San Pablo), a lighthouse, a small archaeological museum and a scattering of whitewashed houses painted in the same ochre-and-white palette they have worn for 250 years.
The marine reserve surrounding the island protects posidonia seagrass meadows that are among the clearest and most biodiverse in the western Mediterranean. Snorkelling directly off the rocks on the island's north shore — where the seagrass begins just a few metres from the surface — you will see sea bream, octopus, starfish and, if lucky, a seahorse clinging to a blade of grass.
How to spend the day
Ferries run from Alicante port (Trasmediterránea and Kontiki lines) and from Santa Pola, which is closer and cheaper. The first boat from Alicante typically leaves at 10:00; the last return is around 19:00 in summer. Day-trippers who arrive early can claim a spot on the small sandy beach inside the harbour walls before the crowds land.
Lunch at one of the half-dozen restaurants on the island is non-negotiable — the caldero tabarcino, a two-course fisherman's stew of rice cooked in fish broth followed by the poached fish itself with all-i-oli, is the dish that has sustained the island's community for generations and is found nowhere else quite like this.
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