Impressions of Torrevieja
This report, covering a number of years, is a compilation of feedback received from cruisers about the port and marinas.
Published 7 years ago, updated 6 years ago
kimg says:
MARINA SALINAS
We came into Marinas Salinas in November 2016 and kept the boat there until June 2017. It is a brand new marina with all facilities and great services. The commercial manager Rodney and his team is the most helpful and service oriented crew we have met during our 18 months in the Med. The town is not exciting, but when it comes to a safe marina, where your boat is looked after by responsible people – this is the place. It is also great value for money, as we paid 2700 euro for six months for 50 feet, all inclusive. There is a bus which leaves every two hours to Alicante airport if you do not want to take the 50 euro taxi. We also used the Salinas yard which have all facilities and kept every promise they made to us – on time. So we are very pleased and can only recommend this Marina Salinas. Regarding the anchoring, everybody is doing it and yes their is probably a rule saying you shouldn’t….
SVSnowflake says:
We spent around 3 years, off and on, at Marina Salinas. We never had a problem anchoring in the harbor, when we were not docking in the marina – by the beach or over by the breakwater of Marina Salinas. We have friends who recently anchored with no issue in the harbor this year many times on their sails along the coast.
The town is convenient – anything you need, you can find (Carrefour, Mercadona, shopping center not far away, and the Manper supermarket is good for meats).
The people are very friendly and helpful throughout the town and at Marina Salinas. At Marina Salinas, check with Rodney if there is a discount for the length of time you will stay. The longer you stay, the better the price. The marina has worked hard to improve security on the docks over the last several years and they have made some upgrades to the laundry and showers. The security for the showers and laundry is not the best, but perhaps they will improve that.
Alicante airport is not far and there is a bus from Torrevieja that goes directly to the airport for around 6 Euros.
There are a couple of chandleries in the town – a new one in Marina Salinas and there is one over by Marina International.
Martinez is a great Yanmar service located in the town and Oscar with Volvo Penta in Marina Salinas is very helpful. Danny has a canvas business in Marina Salinas – I think it’s called Skylines.
We enjoyed our time in Torrevieja and met some incredible people there – many of whom we plan to keep in touch with for years to come.
Wintering at Marina International – 2014/2015
This port has 3 marinas, all good and well protected from the weather. I wintered at Marina International and was very pleased with the deal I got, paying just under €200 pm for a 7-month agreement including the G5 tax. All the marinas are near town and there are plenty of shops, cafes and restaurants at reasonable prices.
Tony Hall
SY Ossian (UK)
Torrevieja
Marina Salinas – Time of visit October 2013
Real Club Nautico – Time of visit March 2014
* Location: Some 20 miles N of Cabo de Palos (Cartagena).
* Approach: Easy – Since it is also a commercial port (ships loading sea-salt) there is more than plenty of space once you rounded the head.
*Warning: Beware of the fish-farms just a few miles S of Torrevieja. They seem not to be too serious about staying within the limits shown on the charts. For us, it was a bit of a Slalom to navigate clear of it.
*Fishing: There are a few “no fishing”-zones between Torrevieja and Cabo de Palos in the S; Don’t try to fish while within these zones (The Guardia Civil is watching!) but outside it is OK and since fish seem not to know about these boundaries fishing is excellent! (Even better on the shoal between Cabo de Palos and Cartagena; Caught 1 Bonito and 2 Llambugas (Golden Makarels) which were absolutely delicious!
*Berthing: There are 3 Marinas in Torrevieja:
First, immediately to StB is “Marina Salinas”;
Next, the RCN (Real Club Nautico), and you’ll see tucked in between Marina Salinas and the RCN straight ahead is the fishing-port with fishing boats leaving and entering at full speed;
And finally to Port of the RCN is the “International Marina Torrevieja.“
Last year in October we did visit “Marina Salinas” and were not too happy with it. This is our report:
Marina Salinas – October 2013, 1942 Classic w/3m draft
Weird approach! No shoreline visible up to just 2 miles prior to arrival. Have been told that to be a common phenomenon in fall/winter.
Huge harbour, easy entrance, Salt docks to your port – hard to miss.
Anchoring in the harbour is prohibited.
Marina Salinas is the first of the three marinas on your STB. side; The other two are close to town and would have been our first choice but no one responded on VHF 9.
Helpful welcome at Marina Salinas.
Stern-to mooring with Electricity & Water right there.
Marina & Jetty open to strangers – no security worth mentioning to be seen during our stay.
Friendly reception – even so the check-in process took almost 2 hours.
As far as pricing is concerned Marina Salinas seemed to be quite interested in negotiating at least a wintering-deal (lots of space available).
Facilities at the marina:
– Only one(!) restroom for entire Marina! Showers – hmm, let’s call them “rudimentary” (or: the worst I have seen in Spain so far. Dirty, broken tiles,…)
– Extremely long walk into town which did not have much to offer in October (probably different in the season?)
– Small chandlery next to the boatyard.
– WiFi did at least not work while we were there.
– Ample water at fuel station (contrary to nautical charts) for our 3 m draft.
– Two or three Restaurants and Bars in the Marina which were closed in October but looked nice.
– Great seafood-restaurant just outside on your way to town.
Noteworthy: There is a small maritime museum just behind the boatyard (accessible from outside of the Marina Salinas) featuring a nice 3 masted Schooner and a Submarine one obviously can visit. (No info on opening hours).
As we weren’t that happy with our visit to Marina Salinas, when we returned in March 2014 we decided to try the Real Club Nautico, and this was by far a much better choice.
Real Club Nautico de Torrevieja
* The inner harbour is huge with plenty of berths – up to 30m no problem.
* Ample depth even for our 3m draft
* Good rates (& ample space) – at least in winter! We did pay € 27.00/day (18m berth) – plus Water and Electricity per consumption.
* Standard Electricity-Plug, no adaptor needed. Electricity is switched on remotely from the office and they can also read your meter at check-out.
* Electronic access key cards to access the facilities and the marina after office hours.
* Security is fairly intense: Have never seen so many CCTV cameras in any other marina.
* Staff is friendly but pretty much limited to Spanish. Marineros are professional and competent.
* Infrastructure: The first major difference to “Marina Salinas”; The RCN Torrevieja is located right at the centre of town – anything you might need and that Torrevieja has to offer is right in front of the door. There is a restaurant/bar right at the office building, featuring also a children’s playground – so it can get noisy on weekends.
* Marina Facilities: Best so far in Spain! Especially the showers that have central-heating are worth mentioning and everybody who has been sailing the Med in Winter will understand how fabulous that is!
* Good size Washing Machine and dryer on site – right inside the building where the showers are.
* Pay-Wifi – but as said before: Prepaid USB-Stick is the better option in Spain since the reception with most Marina Wifi’s is rather poor.
* Piers is not accessible for cars.
Other Services
* There are three boatyards between the 3 Marinas so everybody’s needs for repairs should find solutions.
* Diesel is available at “Marina Salinas” at € 1.33/L (March 2014). You need to call for an attendant, but he usually shows within a few minutes.
*Laundry services available in town.
* No chandlery found in town, but one at Marina Salinas.
Summary: RCN is one of the nicest marinas we have been to in Spain so far!
Peter – 786GlobalTour
Please always check our youtube-channel for our videos also from many/most Marinas visited:
https://www.youtube.com/user/786GlobalTour
Related to following destinations: Mediterranean Coast (Spain), Spain, Torrevieja
With our 17 meter boat, we stayed at the Marina Salinas from October 2016 to October 2017. The marina is new, well maintained, the staff is friendly, helpful and the prices, even the yard, are correct.
Particular mention must be made of the authorized Volvo Penta workshop “Oscar Marine Engines”. Oscar and all his collaborators are competent, timely and available. The prices are always correct. I feel like I recommend it
We kept our 17m boat at Real Club Nautico from November through until March 15, the actual Club and its facilities are excellent, also the staff superb at all times, the price is excellent.
However, due to our 2.2m depth, they had to put us on the outside pontoon, which is terrible to get onto in the normal wind direction! we ended up sideways on the pontoon or two incomings. The town itself is not pleasant in anyway, we moved onto Santa Pola for the summer which is excellent all round.
We used Boats & Barcos for general work, they were reasonable! We used VARADERO SALINAS, S.L. for lifting out and anti fouling, they were superb and very reasonable at circa 1200 Euro including a full hull polish!
June 2014.
We were on passage to Mallorca from Gibraltar when we had a problem with an overheating starter battery and subsequent gas alarm, so we called into Marina International Torrevieja, under sail and at night. The Marineros was helpful and assisted us. The local British Ex Pat Community, especially Rick, Clive and Terry from the Ship Inn were extremely helpful and generous of their time, knowledge and even a car.
The local Volvo Penta Dealer Oscar quickly diagnosed the problem and fixed it at a very reasonable cost. By the way, it was the battery isolator that caused the problem.
Unfortunately, I was less impressed by the Marina staff. I had left my wife tied up alongside while I had taken the alternator off the engine to have it inspected, the marina staff bullied her into moving the boat, alone and undertow and then they charged her 35 euro for the privilege. The other odd thing that happened at Marina International Torrevieja was; they wanted to photocopy my credit card on check-in.
While I had no problem with paying upfront or indeed allowing them to take an electronic copy of my card, as one might do in a hotel, I refused to allow a photocopy to be taken for fear of the fraudulent use of my details. Overall, I was impressed by the warmth of generosity of the British expats, the marina facilities are good, but I found the marina staff to be lacking in basic customer service skills.
MARINA SALINAS
We came into Marinas Salinas in November 2016 and kept the boat there until June 2017. It is a brand new marina with all facilities and great services. The commercial manager Rodney and his team is the most helpful and service oriented crew we have met during our 18 months in the Med.
The town is not exciting, but when it comes to a safe marina, where your boat is looked after by responsible people – this is the place. It is also great value for money, as we paid 2700 euro for six months for 50 feet, all-inclusive. There is a bus which leaves every two hours to Alicante airport if you do not want to take the 50 euro taxi.
We also used the Salinas yard which has all facilities and kept every promise they made to us – on time. So we are very pleased and can only recommend this Marina Salinas. Regarding the anchoring, everybody is doing it and yes there is probably a rule saying you shouldn’t…
We spent around 3 years, off and on, at Marina Salinas. We never had a problem anchoring in the harbour, when we were not docking in the marina – by the beach or over by the breakwater of Marina Salinas. We have friends who recently anchored with no issue in the harbour this year many times on their sails along the coast.
The town is convenient – anything you need, you can find (Carrefour, Mercadona, shopping centre not far away, and the Manper supermarket is good for meats).
The people are very friendly and helpful throughout the town and at Marina Salinas. At Marina Salinas, check with Rodney if there is a discount for the length of time you will stay. The longer you stay, the better the price. The marina has worked hard to improve security on the docks over the last several years and they have made some upgrades to the laundry and showers. The security for the showers and laundry is not the best, but perhaps they will improve that.
Alicante airport is not far and there is a bus from Torrevieja that goes directly to the airport for around 6 Euros.
There are a couple of chandleries in the town – a new one in Marina Salinas and there is one over by Marina International.
Martinez is a great Yanmar service located in the town and Oscar with Volvo Penta in Marina Salinas is very helpful. Danny has a canvas business in Marina Salinas – I think it’s called Skylines.
We enjoyed our time in Torrevieja and met some incredible people there – many of whom we plan to keep in touch with for years to come.