23 things to do in Mojácar, Spain: old town, hidden coves and day trips

Planning a trip to southern Spain? Mojácar deserves a spot at the top of your list. With an almost obscenely pretty old town, glorious beaches and a rugged shoreline made for adventure, it’s one of Andalucía’s most underrated coastal gems. Here’s my guide to the best things to do in Mojácar, plus the day trips worth making from it.

Spain. Just when I think I can’t love it more, I discover a new spot to explore. I’d already worked my way around Andalucía on an epic Spain itinerary: Málaga, Seville, Ronda, Córdoba and Granada, check, check, check, check. But there was one place I’d totally missed: Mojácar.

Hands up if you’ve heard of it. Or were you thinking “where is Mojácar, and why should I go?” Bet it was the latter.

Mojácar is one of those places most people can’t quite locate on a map, and then never stop recommending once they’ve been. It sits on the Costa de Almería, the quieter, wilder eastern end of Andalucía, a short drive north of the desert landscapes of the Cabo de Gata-Níjar Natural Park and some of the clearest water in mainland Spain. If your idea of a good trip involves sunshine, brilliant food and a proper dose of the outdoors, this is the place. Any trip that promises all three is always going to get my vote, which is how I found myself touching down in Almería one July, as part of a campaign in search of the coolest things to do in Mojácar.

There are really two Mojácars: Mojácar Pueblo, the whitewashed old town clinging to a hilltop a couple of kilometres inland, and Mojácar Playa, the long, low-rise beach strip down on the coast. Between them you’ve got 17 kilometres of coastline, wild coves you can only reach on foot and enough to fill a genuinely varied few days. Let’s start up in the old town.

Things to do in Mojácar Pueblo (old town)

Mojácar Pueblo is the town’s biggest draw, and rightly so. A cluster of whitewashed, Moorish-style houses clinging to a maze of steep, winding streets, it’s the archetypal image of southern Spain brought to life. You know those places so pretty they almost don’t seem real? This is one of them. Every corner is another photo in the making, and I took an absurd number and still didn’t feel I had enough.

But it’s far more than a pretty face. This corner of Spain is soaked in history, and Mojácar wears its past openly. The area was under Moorish rule from the 9th to the 15th centuries, and even after the Reconquest the town held onto its Arab character, its layout of tight, shaded lanes designed to keep the fierce sun at bay. Locals have made a real effort to keep it that way, right down to the intricately detailed tiles framing the doorways. From the 1960s onwards, artists, painters and musicians were drawn here, which is part of why it feels quietly cosmopolitan for such a small hilltop village.

White walls, tiled porches, bougainvillea bursting from every nook. It’s simply gorgeous, and the best way to experience it is to abandon any plan and get pleasantly lost in the lanes. As you wander, though, there are a handful of specific spots genuinely worth seeking out. Here they are.

Get lost in the lanes

Before you tick off a single sight, give yourself an hour with no plan at all. The pueblo is small enough that you can’t really get lost, and the best bits are the ones you stumble on: a blue door at the top of a whitewashed stairway, a terracotta pot spilling geraniums, a gap between two houses that suddenly frames the sea. Go early in the morning or in the last couple of hours before sunset, when the light is softer and the lanes are cooler. If you’d like some context as you go, the town hall runs free guided walks of the old town on Saturday mornings in autumn and winter.

Walk through the Puerta de la Ciudad

Start at the Puerta de la Ciudad, the old city gate and the natural entrance to the historic heart of the pueblo. The arch you walk through today was rebuilt in the 16th century on the site of the original Moorish gateway into the walled town, and it still carries the Habsburg coat of arms with its double-headed eagle. Passing under it, with its decorative tilework and the lanes climbing away beyond, is the proper way to begin exploring the old town, and it’s one of the most photographed spots in Mojácar.

Visit the Iglesia de Santa María

Right in the heart of the village stands the Iglesia de Santa María, and it tells you almost everything about Mojácar’s history in a single building. Built around 1560 over the remains of an earlier mosque, it was designed to serve two purposes at once: a church and a defensive fortress. This was a time of frequent pirate raids along the Almería coast, so the church has thick stone walls, a plain, robust exterior and few of the flourishes you’d expect of a grand cathedral. Its tower was even positioned to connect visually with the coastal watchtowers, part of the warning network against seaborne attack.

Step inside if the doors are open and you’ll find a restrained, whitewashed interior, with a decor that’s more unusual than the plain outside suggests. The original altarpiece was lost during the Civil War, and the church holds images of the village’s two patron saints, San Agustín and the Virgen del Rosario. It’s small and quickly seen, but it’s one of the most characterful buildings in town.

Take in the view from the Mirador de la Plaza Nueva

Plaza Nueva is the undisputed social heart of the pueblo, a lively square full of atmosphere, café tables and people-watching, and it doubles as one of the town’s best viewpoints. From its mirador you look out over a wide valley ringed by the Cabrera, Bédar and Almagrera mountains, with the flat-topped hill of Mojácar la Vieja, the town’s medieval forerunner, in the foreground. It’s the ideal spot to sit with a drink and watch the sun go down, and the natural place to pause between wanders.

Climb to the Mirador del Castillo

For the very best panorama, keep climbing to the Mirador del Castillo at the highest point of the pueblo. This was the site of the town’s 13th-century fortress, and there’s almost nothing of it left to see: the great earthquake of 1518 did serious damage, and the one Moorish-era survivor is an old cistern that now houses an art space. But the views more than justify the short, steep walk up. From here you look out across the desert-like landscape on one side and the Mediterranean on the other, from a slightly higher and different angle to Plaza Nueva. It’s one of the town’s most underrated spots, and magical at sunset.

Find La Mojaquera

Beside the church, between the Plaza del Ayuntamiento and the Plaza del Parterre (which was once the town’s Moorish cemetery), you’ll find the white marble statue of La Mojaquera, “the woman of Mojácar,” depicted in traditional dress carrying a water jug on her head. It’s a nod to the village’s history of women collecting water from the fountain down the hill, and since it was unveiled in 1989 it’s become one of the town’s emblems. Local legend has it that touching the statue means you’ll return to Mojácar one day, so do with that what you will.

Drink from the Fuente Mora

At the foot of the old town sits the Fuente Mora, the Moorish fountain. This natural spring was for centuries the practical heart of village life, the place where women came to collect water and wash clothes, and it carries a famous plaque recalling the meeting in 1488 at which Alavez, the town’s last Moorish mayor, negotiated Mojácar’s peaceful handover to the envoy of the Catholic Monarchs. It’s a short walk down from the main town, and a lovely, historic spot to round off your exploration of the pueblo.

Step inside Casa La Canana

For a glimpse of how people in the pueblo actually lived, duck into Casa La Canana on Calle Esteve. It’s a privately run house museum in an early 20th-century home, with more than 200 square metres of rooms set out as a traditional Mojácar household: kitchen, bedrooms, tools and all. Entry costs a few euros, it’s open daily from mid-morning (with extra afternoon hours on some days), and it’s a good half hour if the midday heat drives you indoors.

See where it all began at Mojácar la Vieja

That flat-topped hill you can see from Plaza Nueva is Mojácar la Vieja, the original settlement. People have lived on it since the Copper Age, and the visible remains are of a 12th and 13th-century Moorish town, with a defensive wall and towers, a cistern and houses, abandoned when the population moved to today’s hilltop. It’s a protected site with no visitor centre, but the University of Granada has been excavating there since 2018, and the dig teams run free guided tours in the excavation season. Ask at the tourist office whether one is running during your visit.

Catch a Mojácar Festival

If you can, time your visit around one of the town’s brilliant festivals, when the pueblo comes properly alive. The weekend nearest the 10th of June brings Moors and Christians, a revived tradition in which the whole town dresses up and takes part in a procession commemorating that unique layered history of Moorish and Christian Mojácar.

I happened to catch another of the town’s set pieces, the Noche de las Velas (Night of the Candles), when the electric lights are switched off across the old town and replaced with thousands upon thousands of small candles. Live music, fire processions, drumming bands, the whole village transformed. I was there in summer, but these days it’s held on a Saturday in September, so check the date before you book. If your trip lines up with either, grab the chance with both hands.

Things to do on Mojácar’s coast

Hike the coast on the La Mena footpath

Lace up your boots, because the coastal La Mena hike is too good to miss. If you’re after outdoorsy things to do in Mojácar, this is the first thing I’d point you towards.

This well-marked, relatively easy trail follows the rugged coastline south of town, starting from the car park at the southern end of the Mojácar beach strip. After a short uphill stretch, you’re rewarded with views of brilliant blue water fringed by small coves and beaches you can only reach on foot. The beaches stay quiet even in peak season, and I couldn’t resist stopping a couple of times for a swim. Bring your swimmers, or don’t, as this stretch of coast is something of a nudist haven: Cala de Bordenares and Granatilla are both official naturist beaches.

I took a few shots and some short videos on the drone, and people were losing their minds that this was the south of Spain. Want to see what I mean?

Old fortresses and watchtowers punctuate the shoreline. The path takes you past the 18th-century Macenas Castle and on to the wonderfully squat Torre de Pirulico, which was my favourite spot on the whole route. Climb the steps to the top of the tower for 180-degree views along the coast in both directions. It’s genuinely spectacular, the kind of scenery that has people double-taking when you tell them it’s mainland Spain.

Go sea kayaking in the crystal-clear water

So much of what makes Mojácar special is the natural playground surrounding it, and there’s no better way into it than from the water. I climbed (well, scrambled ungracefully) into a kayak and set off along the coast, and it was one of the highlights of the trip. The water was flat calm and so clear you could see straight down to the sea floor and the marine life drifting below.

If you’ve got the arms for it, spend a full day dipping into remote coves and stopping for a picnic on beaches you’d never otherwise reach. If not, a couple of hours at a gentle pace along the shoreline is just as lovely. Paddle Surf Mojácar, on the seafront Paseo del Mediterráneo, rents kayaks and paddleboards through the summer season, roughly mid-June to mid-September.

Find your own hidden beach

So many people come to Mojácar purely for the beaches that I couldn’t write a things-to-do guide without covering them properly. You could describe Mojácar as a small town with a very large coastline: 17 kilometres of it, from Marina de la Torre in the north to the Rambla de la Granatilla in the south.

At the busier end you’ve got Playa de Mojácar, really a string of smaller beaches running along the Paseo Marítimo, six of which held the Blue Flag in 2026: Marina de la Torre, El Descargador, Piedra Villazar, El Cantal, Lance Nuevo and Venta del Bancal, backed by beach bars and restaurants and everything you need for an easy day. Further along, Marina de la Torre is a touch quieter. But the real magic, for me, is the string of hidden coves south of town.

Rather than spend my days on the big beaches, I hopped on the bus (Mojácar has a genuinely reliable service, with local lines linking the pueblo, the beach strip and the bus station for a little over a euro a ride) to the start of the La Mena footpath and walked out to the quieter coves along the trail. They’re every bit as beautiful and a fraction as busy, though you’ll need to bring everything with you, as there are no facilities. If you want that “own private beach” feeling, this is how you get it.

Stroll the Paseo Marítimo at sunset

I didn’t spend much time on the main beaches, other than popping into a few beach bars for drinks and lunch, but the seafront promenade is where Mojácar Playa comes into its own in the evening. Its central stretch, about a kilometre and a half from the Hotel Indalo to the Cueva del Lobo, was given a smart makeover in 2023, and it’s a lovely, easy walk with the sea on one side and a string of bars and terraces on the other. Time it for the hour before dinner, when the heat drops and the whole town seems to come out for a paseo.

Go diving off the Costa de Almería

Hands up if you’ve always fancied trying diving but never taken the plunge (pun intended). I hadn’t really thought of Spain as a diving destination until this trip, but that changed completely when I headed out with the team at Buceo Mojácar.

I’m PADI qualified, but it had been five years since I got my qualification in Thailand and four since my last dive, so I was feeling rusty and happy to be treated like a total beginner: a theory refresher, a run-through of the kit, and a practice session in the pool before we were let loose in the sea the next day. It was fantastic. The team were fun, enthusiastic and genuinely reassuring, and I’ve never felt safer on a dive. The Costa de Almería has great visibility and a lot of marine life, the perfect combination, and my dive buddy, Gustavo, was an absolute hero: he helped me equalise properly to get down to the bottom, then pointed out everything as we drifted along, including an octopus tucked on the sea floor. Annoyingly, I’d packed the wrong GoPro housing, so you’ll have to take my word for it, but there’s plenty of evidence of our post-dive celebrations. Buceo Mojácar is a PADI five-star centre that runs year-round and caters to everyone from first-timers doing a discovery dive to full PADI courses.

Work on your swing at Marina Golf

Golf: isn’t that just for retirees and ladies who brunch? Absolutely not, as it turns out. I’d only tried it once before, in Dubai, where I ended up dating my instructor, so I thought that session went pretty well even if my swing was dreadful. This time I was pretty excited to have a proper lesson with a pro, sans flirting.

We had ours at Marina Golf Mojácar, an 18-hole course right beside the adults-only Alegría Palacio hotel where I stayed, and it was genuinely good fun. Where else do you get to hammer a buggy up narrow paths and steep slopes, work on your swing, and soak up sweeping coastal views all at once? We finished on the driving range with our instructor, local pro Álvaro Sánchez, analysing our swings and offering tips (in my case, mostly “look at the ball” instead of swinging wildly and hoping for the best). Ninety minutes wasn’t quite enough to turn me into a natural, but it was a big hit with the whole group, and the setting, with the course rolling down towards the sea, is lovely. Highly recommend, whatever your level.

Feast on fabulous food

You can’t come to Spain and not eat well, and like much of the Andalucían coast, Mojácar’s kitchen revolves around fish and seafood. Think fresh sardines liberally salted, skewered and grilled over an open wood fire (the espeto), and simply grilled fish glossy with local olive oil. Everything is fresh and full of flavour.

For a relaxed, full-on Andalucían lunch right by the sand, head to the beach bar-restaurant Chiringuito Cala Marina on Marina de la Torre beach, known for its espetos and skewers. For something more special, book Restaurante Cabo Norte, one of the highest-rated restaurants in town and a genuine treat, serving refined, seasonal Mediterranean cooking in a lovely garden setting. I had the bluefin tuna carpaccio and slow-cooked ox cheek in Pedro Ximénez sauce, and I was still dreaming about that meal a month later. It’s deservedly popular, so book ahead, and note that it’s closed on Tuesdays.

And of course, don’t leave without doing at least one long, lazy afternoon of tapas and a cold caña or a glass of local wine at a beachfront bar. It’s what this coast is made for, and the perfect way to end a day of exploring.

Day trips from Mojácar

Mojácar makes a brilliant base for exploring the rest of the Almería coast and its desert hinterland. Most of these are within an hour’s drive, and a hire car makes them easy.

Eat red prawns in Garrucha

Just ten minutes up the coast, Garrucha is a working fishing town with the second most important port in Almería province, and it’s famous for one thing above all: the gamba roja, the sweet red prawn landed here and served simply grilled with salt. Wander the harbour in the afternoon when the boats come in and the fish auction gets going, then settle in at one of the seafront restaurants for a plate of prawns.

Walk down to Playa de los Muertos

About half an hour south, past the town of Carboneras, Playa de los Muertos is regularly named one of the most beautiful beaches in Spain: a long curve of pale shingle backed by volcanic cliffs, with startlingly clear water. Getting there is part of the adventure, as it’s a steep walk down (a path of around 700 metres, or stone steps from the viewpoint), so wear proper shoes and take water. Parking is paid in summer and fills early. Carry on another 15 minutes or so to Agua Amarga, a pretty whitewashed fishing village with a sandy beach, for lunch.

Go caving in the Sorbas gypsum caves

Around half an hour inland, the Cuevas de Sorbas sit in a protected landscape of gypsum karst, one of the most important of its kind in the world, with more than a thousand caves running beneath it. Guided visits kit you out with a helmet and headlamp and take you through glittering galleries of gypsum crystals; the standard route takes about an hour and a half, and there are longer adventure routes if you don’t mind squeezing through tight spots. Book ahead, especially in summer.

Explore the Cabo de Gata-Níjar Natural Park

An hour south, the Cabo de Gata-Níjar Natural Park is Andalucía’s largest coastal protected area: volcanic hills, salt flats and some of the wildest beaches in Spain. Base yourself in the low-key resort of San José, then head for Playa de Mónsul, with its wind-sculpted rock, and the dune-backed Playa de los Genoveses. In summer, car access to these beaches is capped and a barrier closes when the car parks fill, so go early or use the shuttle bus that runs from San José in high season.

Shop for pottery in Níjar

Around 40 minutes away, the hill village of Níjar has been making pottery for centuries. Head for the Barrio Alfarero, the potters’ quarter, where a handful of family workshops still turn out the region’s glazed ceramics, and look out for the colourful woven jarapa rugs the village is also known for.

Go west in the Tabernas Desert

Under an hour away, the Tabernas Desert is often called Europe’s only desert, and its badlands stood in for the Wild West in dozens of 1960s spaghetti westerns. Two of the old film sets are now theme parks: Oasys MiniHollywood, with its cowboy shows and a zoo, which still hosts film shoots, and Fort Bravo, also known as Texas Hollywood. They’re kitsch, but huge fun, and the drive through the desert is worth it on its own.

So there we are: the coolest things to do in Mojácar. Love it? Read more of my Spain guides:

• Unmissable Things to do in Malaga
• 27 Fun Facts About Spain
• A Step by Step Spain Travel Itinerary
• How to Plan Your Visit to the Real Alcazar of Seville
• Why Menorca is One of Europe’s Hottest Destinations Right Now.

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