Gaat U dit jaar voor het eerst, of voor de zoveelste keer, in Blanes op vakantie? Zie het stadje dan eens vanuit een heel ander perspectief. In plaats van een hotel of camping vakantie biedt Vakantie in Blanes volledig ingerichte appartement.

De gezellige appartementen, ingerichten in typisch Spaanse stijl, liggen vlak bij het mooiste strand van Blanes — aan de rand van het oude stadje.

Met restaurants, een supermarkt, warme bakkers, en een verse groenten en fruit markt om de hoek woont u bij wijzen van spreken midden tussen de dorpelingen.

Are you spending your holidays in Blanes this year? Whether you’ll do so for the first time, or you have visited Blanes many times before, we encourage you to see Blanes from a new perspective.

Blanes Costa Brava offers fully furnished self-catering vacation apartments.

These cosy apartments are very close to Blanes’ most popular beach, at the edge of the old city.

Around the corner are restaurants, a supermarket, bakeries and a daily fruits- and vegetables market.

The storm brought snow to Tarragona, a Catalonia beach resort town 60 miles southwest of Barcelona.

In Sant Antoni de Calonge a strong gust of wind pushed a woman into the sea where she drowned.

Along the coast of Maresme waves reaching a high of 4.5 meters swept away much of the sand redeposited on the beaches last year by the Ministry of the Environment.

And in Blanes the storm carried away 120 meters of the boulevard along S’Abanell beach. The damaged section is at the end of the walk, alongside the campings. Further north the stretch of boulevard repaired and reinforced last year was not damaged in the latest storm.
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While the beach was ready for use by the start of this year’s tourist season, additional sand is needed to bring the beach back to how it was prior to the storms of January and December 2008.

Reconstruction of S’Abanell beach, Blanes.
Photo: Jose Gonsalvo

Delivery of the sand was delayed while Spain’s Ministry of the Environment completed an environmental impact study.

During the next two to three weeks, 250.000 cubic meters of sand will be added to S’Abanell beach. The sand is extracted from a spot off the coast of Arenys de Mar, a beach town in the province of Barcelona, some 20 miles south of Blanes.

The sand is collected, 8.000 cubic meters at a time, in a barge and sprayed onto the beach through a ship-to-shore pipeline. A dragliner redistributes the sand.

S’Abanell beach lines Blanes’ hotel and camping district. However, the reconstruction work takes place in sections of 150 meters at a time, allowing tourists to enjoy the rest of the beach.

Celestino Lillo, Blanes’ councilor for the Environment, thinks the sand will be enough to last through the winter — provided the town isn’t hit by another destructive storm.

Blanes is one of many Costa Brava sea-side resorts where damage that occured during last December’s extraordinary storm is still being repaired.

In 2010 the town hopes to start work on a project to upgrade its tourist district, including the boulevard along S’Abanell beach.

Delivery is now expected to take place in late July or early August.

S’Abanell, one of longest beaches of the Costa Brava, was seriously decimated by last December’s destructive storm.

The Boxing Day storm — said to be the worst the Costa Brava has seen since the late 1950s — caused an estimated €20 million in damage to beaches, boulevards, walkways, bridges and quays along the coast.

In Blanes powerful waves not only dragged most of S’Abanell’s sand out to sea, but also damaged large sections of the promenade alongside the beach.

Much of the beach was reconstructed well before the tourist season started. The additional 250.000 cubic meters of sand was to be in place by June, but delivery was delayed due to environmental impact research.

The search for machinery — with the right capacity and at the right price — further delayed the project.

The extra sand is now expected to be deposited in the last week of June or the first week of August.

S’Abanell beach and boulevard

First-time visitors to Blanes will be delighted with S’Abanell beach even in its current incarnation.

So will return visitors, though they’ll notice that the beach is smaller and somewhat lower than in previous years. The extra delivery of sand will remedy that.

The City Council of Blanes hopes that the construction of an underwater breakwater will go a long way to prevent another cycle of erosion this coming winter.

Meanhwile, the damaged sections of the boulevard along S’Abanell beach have been repaired — in semi-permanent fashion.

Huge boulders have been deposited along large sections of the boulevard. In places where the boulevard was dragged away by the waves, concrete has replaced the decorative red and white tiles.

Sets of stairs have been installed to provide access to the sand, and a wooden fence discourages people from breaking their necks should they try and climb across the rocks.

In several places, potted palm trees are bolted to the concrete.

Change is in the air, though. Some time next year work will commence on a huge project to upgrade Blanes’ tourist district — including Paseo de S’Abanell.

It’s mild climate ensures almost year-round mild weather.

But from time to time, storms do occur. The latest, in December 2008, was one of the worst in more than 50 years.

Summertime tourists and holiday makers the world over will be aghast when they see what happened to their favorite beaches. Some are strewn with the wreckages of fishing vessels, dinghies and even tourist ferries. Others have disappeared altogether:

Blanes Beaches Will Be Back

Just like after the big storms at the beginning of 2008, when the beaches of Blanes disappeared, the sand will be restored in plenty of time for tourist season.

This wide beach (40-60 meters) consists of 2.1 kilometers of clean, somewhat coarse — but comfortable — sand. It stretches past the districts of El Pins and S’Abanell, where most of the town’s 40 hotels are located. Further south it runs past some of Blanes’ campings.

The beach ends at the mouth of the Tordera — a dry river. This remote part — which can also be reached by taking the Avinguda De La Vila De Madrid [Google Map] is designated as the official nude beach [though nudity can be encountered at any beach]. It is seldom busy.

Close to the Avinguda del Mediterrani street [Google Map] there are facilities for the handicapped.

There are kiosks, bars and some restaurants on or near the boulevard along the beach.