Malaga, Alicante or Nice

[PEJ]

I can fly from my local airport to Malaga, Alicante or Nice

So I could, in theory, relocate my boat to either place and fly down to join it at weekends.

Could anybody that knows these places say where they would choose? Bearing in mind it's not just the nicest place but the ease of keeping a boat there and where you can go to on it.

I'd be grateful for any advice.

 

[tcm]

Alicante: I think the city marina excellent. Monstrelli retaurant and Darsena raher fab for lunch too! But local cruising includes um, benidorm and er not sure what else...

Nice: Shortest season of all possibles, and berths likly only available in St Laurent Du Var which is ok, ish, v close 5 mins from airport but quite boat-parkish. Needs checking out. Intresting coasline though with islands etc and nice ports nearby. Unlikely to get place in Nice itself and not sure you wd want to as it is entirely locals in grim end of town and bit commercial with lorries and corsica traffic in same port.

Malaga: dunno. Longest warm season tho. Againseems a bit turn-left-or-right crusing and not desperately great coastline altho some of the blocks of flats are a more interesting shade of white than others, perhaps.

So i wd do a year in each!

 

[Mike_S]

If you click on the link at the bottom of my post, it'll take you to my mate's website. They're near to Cabopino and Benalmedina marinas close to Malaga. There's some photos on there of Cabopino and apart from being a bit tight, it all looks very nice. Will find out for certain in a few weeks when we go to visit but I'm told Cabopino is about 1/2hr from Malaga airport.

There's also some beautiful places within a spit of Nice airport, Cassis etc.

 

[Deleted User YDKXO]

We've had our boat on the Cote D'Azur flying into Nice, Denia flying into Alicante and now Majorca flying into Palma.
The Cote d'Azur is fabulous. The weather is relatively benign, the eating out is (mostly) excellent and the general ambience is obviously more sophisticated than Spain. The cruising is good although a bit go left or right. It's reachable from the UK by car and train as well as plane and there's loads of stuff to go and see if you can't do boating. On the negative side, you will be very lucky to find a berth, the cost of fuel is higher than Spain and the cost of everything else is higher and by that I mean things like taxis, car hire, food, restaurants and boat maintenance
It's certainly cheaper to be a tourist and keep a boat on the Costa Blanca coast around Alicante but thats about all I could say in it's favour apart from the fact that you'll likely be able to find a berth. Although it's further south than the Cote d'Azur, it seems to me to be windier which is a bit of a problem because the coastline does'nt have much shelter from onshore winds. In a stiff wind from any direction other than the west, the sea is lumpy there. The towns can be hideous (eg Benidorm), eating out and supermarket food can be v poor
I've never boated around Malaga but on the few occasions I've been there, it's been windy but maybe others can comment
Can you fly to Palma from your airport? The cruising around the Balearics is excellent and it seems to be less windy than the Costa Blanca. The islands are a bit more upmarket than the Costa Blanca and there's just a chance you might find decent food but the overall costs are still lower than the Cote d'Azur

 

[Sundays_Child]

I don't think the south of Spain is a very good boating location. Driving inland is a totally different matter. I lived in Malaga from 1970-76. While the coast may have gone to sh!t inland keeps improving.

Alicante sounds interesting... no French there /forums/images/graemlins/tongue.gif

 

[oldgit]

Nice has wonderful old town with loads of eateries of all classes to explore.However Unless you enjoy par boiling in the summer heat you will need to have air con on the boat,if only to be able sleep at night.
Others here can prob give you chapter and verse of this subject,but expect to add £5K plus to your upfront costs,if it can be fitted at all.

 

[PEJ]

Thanks for the excellent advice.

I think I'll go and check out Nice.

 

[PEJ]

Well just come back from a weekend in Nice and am pleased to say the comments above are spot on.

Despite the weather there is more ambience in my marina (ocean village) than at St Laurent du Var Port but it is OK. The location seems to have a bit of everything. Old town charm, big new squares and a promande for strolling. Things for the kids and the teenagers (shopping). I liked Villefrance, around the corner from Nice, more of a quiet village feel.

I think its OK to be a snob on this forum isn't it? Well I am going to be anyway - best of all I did not see a single football shirt wearing, short haired, tattooed english person the whole time I was there - now thats my kind of place!

 

[oldgit]

"did not see a single football shirt wearing, short haired, tattooed english person the whole time I was there "

Corse not .........they all stay on their boats. /forums/images/graemlins/smile.gif