About Moraira Town

The delightful town of Moraira has grown considerably from a small coastal hamlet in the 1950's where local fishermen lived and stored their boats and nets. Today a smaller fishing fleet, around 5 boats, still operates from the harbour and the fish auction held on the quayside is a popular daily event.

Moraira town today has become an important family holiday destination and a much sought after area for discerning ex pats and retirees from Northern Europe. Top quality restaurants abound not only in the town but along the coast to Benissa and inland to Teulada.

An excellent school, medical centre and sports facilities are all to be found in Moraira and the frequent local fiestas are popular with residents and tourists alike. My own favourite is the Moors and Christians with the exotic parades that go on for days on end and culminate in a floodlit battle on the beach and a magnificent firework display.

The local planners have prevented unsympathetic development, characteristic of other Spanish coastal resorts, with rigid planning control. Apart from the town centre edificios most properties are restricted to two stories high. One exception is the twin blocks overlooking El Portet "Mili" and "Pili".

The terrain slopes gently down from the pine clad foothills to the coast providing views of the Moraira coastline uncluttered with high-rise buildings. Several streams run down the valley into a lagoon and across the beach to the sea.
The Moraira valley, still with working vineyards producing the local Muscatel grapes, has been designated as a green belt. When harvested the grapes are taken to the co-operative bodega in Teulada where the sweet Muscatel dessert wine is produced.

The Moraira foothills covered in pine forests are where most villas are situated, perfect orientation provides the majority with a southerly downhill view towards the sea. The hills provide shelter from the winter weather and cool sea breezes in the summer.

Residential property in Moraira is mainly detached villas with private swimming pools and the typically Spanish "pueblo-style" developments with community pools.

There are few holiday hotels in Moraira and this dictates to some extent the holidaymakers who patronise the resort who tend to be mainly families since the accommodation available is fairly limited to privately owned villas.

Families with young children will find the gently sloping beaches a safe environment for young children to enjoy. In addition to the Main Moraira beach (Playa la Ampolla) there are several further smaller beaches, L.Andrago. Las Rocas and El Portet. The latter is popular with Spanish families on Sundays for the excellent Paellas available at the two seafront restaurants. Both have been owned and worked by the same families for as long as I can remember and certainly going back to the mid-seventies when I first visited Moraira.

Prices have changed a bit since then but good value is still to be had and a meal or a beer at a table overlooking the Med is still a very affordable pleasure.

The population of Teulada-Moraira is around 16,000 but this number swells to maybe 30-35,000 in the peak holiday season. Most year round residents are Northern European and many take advantage of the good returns available in renting their properties out for the holiday season.