Port de la Selva: get away from it all on the Costa Brava

As we drove along the winding road from Llançà in a borrowed car we began to catch glimpses of the tiny fishing village with whitewashed walls and a church in the heart of the village standing proud.

We had settled on Port de la Selva after considering and finally rejecting Menorca, after being told about its beauty and how peaceful it was even at the height of summer.

After finding the agency to collect the keys to our studio apartment we unloaded the car and quickly settled in; it was basic, but had all we needed. The shower was cramped and as we both discovered later, an elbow in the wrong direction would turn the hot tap full on to scalding, but everything worked as well as we needed it to.

On the beach we were soon in the water, which after the beaches south of Barcelona and around l’Escala where we’d already spent some days, was a shock. The water was clear, for sure, but it was a good few degrees cooler too.

Nonetheless, we soon got used to the water temperature, explored like crazy for our week there, swam, walked, drove, ate and drank. We had a fantastic time, but still one of the things that staggered us was the number of people on the beach, which was never overcrowded. Many of the people there were Catalans, although there are many foreign owned holiday homes in the area too, but few words of English could be heard.

And at night, with the exception of the youngsters at the nightclubs, people got to bed early – in fact a little too early for us. We sat out on the terrace with the hillside view (a few years later we upgraded to a two bedroom apartment with a sea view) and sipped wine until the early hours. But what I remember thinking during that first year was about the silence. A ‘quiet’ resort on the Costa Brava still doesn’t sound much like it is actually going to be quiet, but it really was.

More than a decade of changes

Now, since then (that was 1999) there have been a few changes, some of them positive, but a few, at least as far as we were concerned, absolutely catastrophic.

Port de la Selva is located on the north of Cap de Creus, the protected cape that forms the most easterly point of the Iberian peninsular and is an area of outstanding beauty. Most of the cape, including the waters, is now protected as a natural park and so construction of new houses is limited.

However, within a few years of that first visit a number of houses were built right on the edge of the natural park, overlooking the bay below. To add insult to injury they are ugly, and despite having a millionaire’s view the development was designed to cram as many dwellings into the plot as possible. Several years on the houses are looking quite run down, so quality doesn’t appear to have been a priority for the developer either.

Another development appeared on the hillside on the other side of the village a few years after that, again designed in glass, concrete and (at least the first houses) stone. However, they seem to have had difficulty selling these houses and the more recent ones lack the stone cladding of the first few, showing how mucg the developer has had to rein in costs. We took a look at one of these houses once, but found them small and lacking a decent view; rather than looking out to sea, many of them look over allotments, as well as the sewage works!

On the other hand, the building in the centre of the village containing the fish market was demolished and the new building, which also contains and hotel and spa, was constructed sympathetically fit in with the rest of the town.

What to do there

Okay, so that’s the negative over as far as I’m concerned and if you’ve never been there and not seen the changes then they won’t really affect you anyway.

The town beach is a good size and on the whole not overcrowded, although it gets busier at weekends when the locals travel from Barcelona and Girona to stay in their holiday homes.

The sand is a bit dirty (I said I’d finished with the negatives, didn’t I?) but it is a gentle slope into the water making it ideal for kids, but if you swim out to the buoys then the water is a few metres deep, so good for anyone wanting more than a splash in shallow water. The water is extremely refreshing too, a bout two degrees cooler than the water down in Estartit for example.

The rock formations are typical of the Cap de Creus, consisting of volcanic rock containing air bubbles. You can see this type of rock in some of Salvador Dalí’s paintings; he owned a house at Portlligat, near Cadaqués, which is on the east of Cap de Creus and popular with artists.

As well as the main beach there are a number of stony beaches along the shores and the rocks can make a good base for the day, especially if you like snorkelling. Not so good for kids, and my back aches at the end of a day sunbathing on the unyielding surface of the rock. One of my favourite spots is known as the “Devil’s wells”, which I call “hell’s wells” (aren’t I a comedian?). Two underwater caves vent to the surface, which is particularly impressive on days when the northerly Tramuntana wind is blowing, with water bellowing up and foam sprayed into the air. If you fell in you wouldn’t stand a chance…

If you want to do something other than swim and sunbathe then there are a number of activities. The local dive centre goes out twice a day including, unlike many dive operators, when the wind is blowing and the waves metres tall – luckily I just don’t get seasick, but many people have to hold on to the content of their stomachs when it gets really rough but. You can also hire jet skis, water ski and various other water sports if the desire takes hold.

There are some good walks, including the paths along the shore to the lighthouse and then Llançà, although some points demand a good head for heights. The paths have been considerably upgraded over the last few years though, and many sections that were rocky have been levelled.

The monastery of Sant Pere de Rodes is also work visiting at least once. We drove the winding road up there but you can walk, although it’ll take a few hours but the view from up on top is worthwhile. We decided to climb up to the castle above the monastery, but turned back after the heavens opened up, as we weren’t prepared.

Where to eat

Ca l’Herminda is popular among the well off and serves a variety of seafood dishes, including sea cucumbers, although I’ve never eaten there. Near the port area there are a number of restaurants with glass houses in front. They don’t look particularly pretty, but practical for when the Tramuntana is blowing, and they do have tables outside too.

Monterrey serves pretty good food and is better than Bellavista, but neither is particularly expensive. I used to enjoy Can Marcelino, but the service was terrible, the waiting staff rude and the food didn’t agree with me on a couple of occasions, so I vowed never to go back.

There is also a restaurant on the road out of town, although I forget the name, which serves reasonable food and is rather quieter than the restaurants in the centre of the village; perhaps it has closed, as it doesn’t appear on Google maps; and El Chalet is good for lunch and well shaded.

There are also a couple of pizzerias and various sandwich bars and if you plan on cooking then there are a number of supermarkets, although they are quite limited in many respects and you may want to venture over to Llançà, or further afield. While you might expect fish to be cheap, given that it is a fishing village, in fact the prices will make your eyes smart.

Accommodation

There are many privately owned villas and apartments in the area, with few hotels. We used to rent through Agència Port de la Selva, but while they were once efficient, they are no longer to the extent that they failed to even contact us last year (2012); that summer was the first year since 1999 that we didn’t go to Port de la Selva, although we had decided to give it a miss now that we live outside Barcelona.

Hotel-Spa Cap de Creus opened just a few years ago and is an aparthotel located right in the harbour area; Porto Cristo is a nice looking hotel; Cal Mariner is modern with a few rooms and a popular restaurant (although I’ve never eaten there) and l’Arola offers rooms as well as camping and we see people go back there year after year, which is always a good sign.

Tags: Holidays, Places, Port de la Selva, Tourism