The Neighborhood and Beach: The villa is at the sea front of a quiet, lonely and safe residential area with about 10 family houses surrounded by a clean and fine beach and a beautiful landscape of pine and eucalyptus woods, all within a littoral Nature reserve with plenty of birds, some rabbits and chameleons.
The beaches are truly breathtaking with whiter and finer sands than their Mediterranean counterparts. The beaches are typically framed by sand dunes and pine trees creating natural landscapes. Here, the Atlantic Ocean is clean and its beaches, 40 metres wide on average, are a lot wider than most beaches on the other coasts of Spain. The gentle slope of the ocean floor and the sand banks just off the coast ensure that the sea is always calm and safe to swim in along the whole beach with just gentle surf and never any big and dangerous waves. Size of beach & the Nature reserve ensure that there is plenty of space on sand to enjoy sunbathing, beach sports & walks.
TV satellite, Gastronomy and Transport: TV Satellite: The villa is wired for TV satellite reception providing a number of international channels.
Gastronomy: The rich gastronomy of the area is mainly based on wide variety of seafood (tuna, sea bass, gilthead, mussels, prawns, lobsters, etc), which are caught daily and pork products such as Iberian meat, ham, sausages.
Transport: Connected by toll-free highways with Isla Cristina, the closest international airports with car hire facilities are in Portugal Faro, in Spain Sevilla, Jerez and Malaga (Costa del Sol) at 30 min, 1 h 15 min, 2 hours and 3 h, respectively. Besides airlines, public transport includes express direct buses to/from Huelva, Seville, Madrid, etc, high velocity trains to/from Seville, Madrid, etc.
Restarurants, cafes and supermarkets: Many restaurants in the area. Specialities are fresh sea fish, mussels, prawns, lobsters, etc and Iberian meat, ham and sausages. Not expensive to dine out.
Owners favourites: 1) A beach hut cafe and restaurant at the site named Casita Azul (200 metres along beach). The friendly Manolo & his family cook and serve excelent quality lunch, dinner and coffee and the sea front is just wonderful. 2) Restaurant Cacheron (good & cheap) & El Estudiante (Extremadura St.) and 3) La Gola, the las three at Isla Cristina.
Try breakfast of coffee with churros (long pancake sticks) at Gran Via and other cafes in España street in Isla Cristina.
Open market and supermarkets:
Isla Cristina has a market with a great offer of open sea fish, meat, fresh fruit and vegetables. Well supplied supermarkets in town are Eroski, Dia, Lidl and Jamon.
Furthermore, in Isla Antilla resort, Antilla town (3-5 km) there are commercial centres, golf courses, country clubs, shops, supermarkets, cinemas, restaurants.
Golf:
There are two excellent golf courses, Isla Canela and Isla Antilla (27 holes), at 1-6 mille from the villa. Visitors are welcome. Facilities include; Full Grass Driving Range, Putting Green, Chipping Green, Practice Bunkers, Resident Golf Professional.
Isla Antilla (1 mille) is the perfect place to explore the golf courses close to the border between Spain and Portugal, only the Dunes of Doñana course at Matalascanas being more than an hour away by car. The beauty of the courses close to Isla Antilla is that they are all rather different. Compared to the Western Algarve and the Costa del Sol, Costa de la Luz – Huelva and the Eastern Algarve are as yet ‘undiscovered’. Green fees are lower, the courses are less crowded and less busy making it much easier to get a start time that you want and to be able to get round in reasonable time without delays. Other golf courses in the area include Isla Canela, Nuevo Portil, El Rompido in Spain and Castro Marim, Benamor, Quinta da Ria, Quinta de Cima in Portugal.
