I am sorry to hear about your troubles Carol.

La Marina is split into two distinct parts. La Marina ‘village' is on the coast side of the main N332 road and is a pleasant and clean town, with a majority of Spanish residents.

I suspect that you will be staying in La Marina urbanization, which is a very large, predominantly British housing development a few kilometres to the inland side of the main road.

A car will be essential.

There is a main square and a weekly market and there are restaurants and bars, but your Villa could be a long way from any of the facilities.

As a holiday base La Marina is not too bad, as long as you are mobile. The nearby beaches are far better than those on the Orihuela Costa, they are very wide and several kilometres long. Therefore they never get crowded, and you don't get the usual hassle from touts. When driving from the urbanization you will go under the coast road, you then have a choice. Drive through the village of La Marina and turn left at the traffic lights (by the large ceramics shop), and continue to a section of bars on the beach. Alternatively, continue straight through the traffic lights (past the garden centre on your right) and turn left at the large blue camp site sign and follow the narrow road through the pine forest to the beach (there are a few small but quite good restaurants along the way). Here, if you walk along the beach to the right you will come to the naturist section which stretches all the way south to the inlet of the River Segura, or walk to the left for the ‘family' stretch.

A few kilometres south of La Marina is the town of Guardamar del Segura. This would be a destination of choice for nightlife. There are hundreds of places to eat and drink there, and being popular with Spanish holiday makers, the place offers good value for money.
La Marina is well situated to explore Santa Pola to the north, and Elche which is inland. Out of the three places that your holiday might have been in, I think that La Marina is probably the best.

If you need more help, recommendations for the ‘hidden' restaurants that you would not normally find, or just generally where to go, please post back.

hi carolaustin if you let us know where abouts the villa is wil let you know what facilities are near by as my parents live there, as oly daze says you will need transport as its a long walk to the beach (my mrs had the bright idea fo walking there once damned long way from parque del mino )

Thanks for your comments, it sounds fine. I think the advert does mention the urbanization but we are hiring cars so thats not a problem. I havent got the full address yet tho. As long as we get our money back quickly to pay for this villa we should be ok. Thanks again, thats put my mind at rest a little!