Elche

Discover Elche ✔ ✔ Everything you need to know: What to see, what to do, beaches, weather and special events ❤️ in this fantastic town.

Elche (in Valencian language Elx) is a city of the Costa Blanca located in the province of Alicante. The Municipality has more than 200,000 inhabitants, being the third most populated city in the Valencian Community and the second in the province of Alicante.

It is the only Spanish city that has three properties registered in the different categories of World Heritage of UNESCO and that makes it unique.

The historic Palm Grove of Elche is a unique cultural landscape, a living cultural legacy of medieval Muslim-Spanish culture. It has a characteristic feature that makes it different from the rest of the palm groves in the world, and it is "the white palm", a living relic of the culture of the ancient Mediterranean palm trees. The first recognition arrived in the year 2000, when the historic Palm Grove was declared a World Heritage Site.

Misteri A year later, in 2001, the category of Masterpiece was given to the Misteri, or Festa d'Elx. It had the undoubtedly deserved honor of being the first Spanish festive manifestation that figured in it.

School Museum of Pusol. This unique space, whose full name (and very close to reality) is the Centro de Cultura Tradicional School Museum of Pusol, became part of the Exemplary Practices Registry in 2009, whose inclusions are decided by the UNESCO.

And if the city of Elche is known for something, it is for its "DAMA", which boasts the rare privilege of  being in two places at once: in the National Archaeological Museum of Madrid and in the heart of all ilicitanos, without exception.

The weather in Elche

The city has one of the lowest rainfall in Europe and Mediterranean temperatures ranging from an average of 17ºC in January to 29ºC in August. Its more than 3000 hours of sun a year, making it a very visited city, both in its Urban Center and on its beaches.

What to see in Elche

The 326.5 square kilometers of the municipal district of Elche offer the visitor a great variety of landscapes, habitats, fauna and flora, distributed in three ecosystems: the mountains and hills that make up the mountain ranges of the interior of the municipality, the dune sets of the coast and the typical Mediterranean coastal wetlands that develop between both spaces.

The wetlands of Elche are one of the most important groups of the Valencian Community and one of the last vestiges of the numerous marshes (also called salt marshes) existing in its coastal strip. Only the Albufera de Valencia exceeds in ecological and ornithological importance the natural park of El Hondo, shared by Elche and Crevillent.

The Clot de Galvany, integrated into the set of wetlands connected to the dune system of Arenales and Carabassí, is another of the outstanding elements of Elche's rich environmental heritage.

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What to do in Elche

• Spotting birds in the natural parks of El Hondo and Las Salinas, as well as in the natural area of Clot de Galvany.

• Diving in the very rich sea beds of the coast of Elche.

• Walk through the palm orchards, the pine forests of some of its beaches and the parks and natural spaces.

• Enjoy and the most fun Multiaventura Park in the province in a magical setting surrounded by palm trees in Elche Palmeral Adventures.

• Fly in balloon over the immensity of palm groves, beaches and wetlands.

• Ice skating on one of the only two ice rinks in the Valencian Community.

• Share a day with sea lions, macaws, giraffes and an Asian elephant in Rio Safari, specialized in the breeding and care of exotic animals.

• And, for the little ones, to live exciting adventures of the hand of the nice character Ili Palmir.

Who can resist to so many and different temptations?

The Beaches of Elche

The municipality has nine kilometers of fine white sand. Six large beaches, form the coast of Elche, divided in two by the municipality of Santa Pola. To the north, the beaches of El Altet, Arenales del Sol and El Carabassí, while in the south, you will find the beaches of El Pinet, La Marina and Les Pesqueres-El Rebollo full of extensive pine forests.

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The Holidays in Elche

1. The Misteri, or Festa d'Elx heads, in August, the rich and ingrained festive calendar of Elche.
2. December commemorates, with the Coming of the Virgin, the legendary origin of the Festa: the sacred image arrived by sea in an ark that also contained the consueta to carry out the summer performances.
3. Other fundamental milestones are Palm Sunday, with thousands of white palms, from the palm grove and the meticulous work of craftsmen, accompanying the passage of the triumphal entry of Jesus in Jerusalem, popularly known as the burreta; and on Resurrection Sunday, when they are thrown on the image of the Risen Jesus and, very especially, of the patron saint, the Virgin of the Assumption, millions of colorful pieces of paper, called alleluias, which give the procession its name.
4. In August also, in addition to the Moors and Christians, which recall the conquest of the city by the troops of King James I in 1265, the Nit de L'Albà, on the night of the 13th and the Nit de la Roà, in the early morning from 14 to 15, accompany the representations of the Mystery.

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