We had walked around Alicante town, visiting the ‘Mercat Central’ market, and wandering around the streets of the ‘El Barrio’ old town before deciding we should head up to see the dominant feature of Alicante – the Santa Barbara castle at the top of a huge hill overlooking the town and sea.
There are a number of ways you can get to the top of Santa Barbara Castle.
There’s a lift (like an actual lift, not a chair-lift / cable car), a road which you can just drive up or catch a bus up, or you can walk up a well made gravel and rock path, which winds its way up the steep hillside, with plenty of viewpoints on the way up.
Although it looks like quite a long walk, it wasn’t actually too long, taking us about half an hour in total, including stops to enjoy the views and take photos on the way up.
We were here in April, so not the height of the boiling hot Spanish summer, but temperatures were pretty warm – well into the mid to high 20s.
It was fine for walking up, but knowing what the heat is like in the middle of summer, it’s not a walk we’d want to do in the middle of a summer day!
It’s exposed directly to the sun all the way up and is fairly steep most of the way.
If we’d been here in mid-summer, we’d probably have waited until the evening and gone up when it was cooler – and had the added benefit of being able to see the sunset over the city too.
The path is well marked and you simply follow it up the hillside until you reach the entrance to the castle at the top of the hill.
Entry to the castle is free of charge – they just try to divert you through the gift shop once you’re up there.
There’s not a huge amount to do at the top, the main attraction is the view over the city and the Mediterranean sea beyond, which we enjoyed and found worth the effort of walking up there.
The walk back down took about 20 minutes, and takes you right back into the middle of the restaurants area of the old town, which is ideal for recovering from the effort with a well-earned lunch or dinner.
To find the start of the path up to Santa Barbara Castle, you’ll need to be in the centre of the El Barrio old town of Alicante.
The path starts at the Parc de l’Ereta, which you can find the exact location of on Google Maps here.
Once there, look for the start of the zigzag path. Head up there and you’ll soon find yourself on the hillside, winding your way up.
You can just walk up the main road (and Google Maps’ walking directions tried to send us that way) although that’s not as ideal as taking the footpath up, so make sure you’re on the walking path and not on the main road.
When you get close to the top, you’ll see the main road with its car park and bus stop, and you might wonder whether it would’ve just been easier to drive up or get the bus – but the walk had better views and greater satisfaction once it was over!