Alicante Guide - Article No.013

.Navigation links. .Submit Article. .Alicante Guide 012. .Alicante Guide 014

Spanish Towns of Contrast Villajoyosa and Benidorm

By Steve Locke

Article Word Count: 394

Situated between the Costa Blanca cities of Alicante and Benidorm on the N-332 coast road the old town of Villajoyosa is a popular and famous resort. Perhaps best known for its multi-coloured fisherman's houses and for its production of chocolate, Villajoyosa is one of the towns visited by the many "blanket trips" which travel around this part of the Spanish coastline.

Not only does Villajoyosa have a name which means literally "Jewelled Town" but has also for many years been known as "Chocolate Heaven" being very famous for its production of Spanish chocolate delicacies and for the traditional turrón.

The museum in Villajoyosa relates the tal of one Don Valeriano López Lloret who began his chocolate business in the town way back in 1881 - the family business is still in existence today although using more advanced technological processes, but still employing age old secret recipes, a trip to the Valor chocolate factory is a must for visitors to the town - while you are there why not try one of their steaming hot chocolate drinks - mmmn heaven.

The multi-coloured fisherman's houses are Villajoyosa's most picturesque feature and history tells that the houses were painted in different shades of ochre, red, yellow and indigo blue so that the fishermen could recognise their houses from far out at sea and therefore find their way safely home, it would no doubt also have been a comfort during long hours at sea. There is still a busy fish harbour in Villajoyosa and a bustling afternoon fish market where the day's catch is sold off to the highest bidder.

Fishing has been the mainstay of the town's economy for centuries although tourism has taken over in recent years, this stretch of coast being particularly popular with the huge resort of Benidorm a little way up the coast.

Benidorm is of course a massive tourist attraction and its amazing theme parks Terra Mitica, Aqualandia, Terra Natura and the Mundomar Marine and Exotic Animal Park attract hundreds of thousands of visitors each year. Benidorm is very different from its neighbour Villajoyosa which still retains much of its original charm, being a slick modern resort with massive high-rise hotels and apartment blocks.

If you are visiting the area you can take your pick high-rise , hustle, bustle Benidorm or charming chocolate heaven Villajoyosa - I know which I would choose.

The author of this article on Villajoyosa and Benidorm is Steve Locke who lives on the Costa Blanca in Spain. Steve writes travel articles for his local newspaper and is interested in Spanish history especially the Arab Occupation of Spain. His website contains hundreds of interesting articles about Spain. You can find more about Benidorm here: http://www.needahandspanishproperties.com/benidorm-factfile.html and further info on Villajoyosa here: http://www.needahandspanishproperties.com/villajoyosa.html.

Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Steve_Locke

Article Source: EzineArticles.com

Submit Your Article

The goal of Alicante Spain Articles directory is to provide useful tourist information to all travelers that plan to visit Alicante, Costa Blanca and Spain. You are invited to contribute with your original articles. Doing that, you can obtain numerous benefits, such as increasing the number of visitors of your website, getting targeted traffic, find new customers and spread the word about your business.

The following Submit Article form helps you to easily submit your article. The fields with an asterisk are obligatory. If accepted, the article will be published in an appropriate category (you can also suggest it). You are allowed to place one link towards your website in the source section (About you and/or your website). If you accept to provide a reciprocal link from your site, you can add two more links within the text of the article.

As HTML code is not enabled in the Submit Article form, please use the following code when adding your links:

replacing www.your-site.com with your URL and Your Text with a title or a keyword you want to highlight.

Reciprocal link:

You can link to Holidays in Alicante Spain website by copying and pasting the following HTML code directly into the code of your site:

The code will cause the added link to open into a "new" window. In that way, your visitor will not abandon your site (which will still be opened underneath the new window). Once you have put our link on your website, indicate us which is the page containing the reciprocal link by filling in the appropriate field of the following Submit Article form: