Orihuela Costa beach bars finally begin to open this weekend
The first chiringuitos ready for business will be in Cabo Roig and Campoamor
It seemed like it was never going to happen but after a long, long wait, Orihuela Costa residents finally have something to celebrate as the beach bars on its 11 shores are starting to go up this week.
Local social media pages lit up on Tuesday April 16 with photos of the first workers assembling the beach huts as the final details of the new contracts have at last been ironed out.
The chiringuitos have been closed since January last year and every trace of the facilities were removed from the beaches in November. Although the council missed its initial April deadline by a fairly long chalk, it now looks like the bars of La Glea in Campoamor and La Caleta in Cabo Roig are just about ready to open this coming weekend.
Sadly, the weather doesn’t seem too keen to play along, but it is doubtful that will stop anyone enjoying a beverage after such as long, hard slog.
Many of the delays came about as a result of the decision to break up the beach bars and water sports facilities into separate lots, necessitating several different tender processes. Ironically, Chiringuitos del Sol, the company that managed all of the bars before this debacle began, will once again take over La Caleta and Cala Bosque in La Zenia.
Incidentally, both of these chiringuitos and the toilet facilities will be allowed to open all year round. Ultimately, by breaking up the beach bars into different lots, the Orihuela City Council stands to double its income, earning around 2 million euros annually from these services.
On the other hand, it could be argued that they’ve actually lost millions by keeping them closed for so long.
At this stage, all of the contracts have been awarded bar one: the lot which encompasses the beaches of Punta Prima, Cala Estaca and Cala Mosca. Workers have been spotted around all week, but they’re not erecting any bars, so the situation still appears to be up in the air.
Cala Mosca in particular has been plagued with sewage spills and stagnant pools of water gathering, so these issues will presumably need to be resolved before the chiringuitos will go up.
Image: La Zenia/Facebook
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