My family of 5 plans to make the southern coast of Spain home for a couple of months. We are doing Barcelona and Madrid the first week then, or hoping to travel down south, and let that be our homebase. We are choosing the southern coast that time of year mainly for the sun and warmer weather. Any recommendations on best areas to stay with kids? (11, 9 and 5yo)
Also my daughter has celiac, so if anyone knows a kid friendly place with good food that would be great!!
Will you have a car?
We are hoping to not have to get a car and just stay in a small town that we could walk or bike and then if we wanted to take day trips, places, we could figure that out
But we have never done this and are very open to suggestions
Going into this you should know that the three most historically important cities in Andalucia (Seville, Cordoba and Granada) are not on the coast and will in most cases require at least 2 hours' travel time by public transportation from any small town on the coast. Driving to any of those cities and looking for a place to park a car wouldn't be fun, and in some cases it would take a lot longer than a train. An exception would be a place near Malaga, from which you might get to Cordoba in about 1-1/2 hours by a combination of local train and express train.
Tickets on the fast trains often needed to make day trips to Seville, Cordoba and Granada practical can be very expensive if not purchased well in advance, likely making spur-of-the-moment trips very costly--especially considering you'd have to pay for a round trip and wouldn't even have a full day at the destination. There's also the fact that all three cities would deserve more than one day-trip.
Edited to add: I'd position Barcelona and especially Madrid at the end of this trip, rather than the beginning, for odds of warmer weather--especially in Madrid. Madrid's average low temperature in February is 38.7 F, and it's 43.2 F in March. That's not a trivial consideration, given that Spain operates on a very late schedule, with the locals heading out for dinner at 10 PM.
Is there a reason you want to spend multiple winter/early-spring months in a single location on the coast? It won't be warm enough to swim, and the coast won't be appreciably (if at all) warmer than Cordoba and Seville. If the coast is a must, choose your location very carefully. Much of the coast has been turned into low-budget holiday spots for Northern Europeans seeking sunshine. As a result, thay are full of high rises, British pubs and German sausage joints. It can be hard to find any remaining Spanish character. That said, we have a few posters who know that area well (I do not) and can suggest some options to you.
I do know there are regional rail lines fanning out from Malaga (a very attractive city), so I think a smaller place with a train station in Malaga's orbit might be a fairly convenient choice for making some side trips.
Cadiz is an historic city on the coast (good access to Jerez, which has some horse shows the kids might like), but I'm less sure about easy transportation into and out of Cadiz from surrounding small towns.
These links may help you investigate transportation options:
Main Renfe website for regular trains: https://www.renfe.com/es/en
Commuter rail around Malaga: https://www.renfe.com/es/en/suburban/suburban-malaga/timetables << link corrected
Commuter rail around Cadiz: https://www.renfe.com/es/en/suburban/suburban-cadiz/timetables
ViaMichelin for routes and driving-time estimates: https://www.viamichelin.com/
For buses, I just Google something like bus Malaga to Granada. Not every town has a train station.
If you want a place with few tourists head east of Malaga as that part of Spain isn’t on most tourists from the U.S. radar. Also check on stores and restaurants for where you want to go. Smaller beach towns generally shut down when tourist season ends and don’t fully open until May or so. That means there will be fewer options. The Costa Del Sol is always open, but no longer has a typical Spanish feel as acraven mentioned. If all you want to do is hang out, any medium to large city would work. If you plan on taking occasional day trips, pick a city with good public transportation.
Also my daughter has celiac, so if anyone knows a kid friendly place with good food that would be great!!
Lucky for you that covers 99% of Spain! Also most of Spain's cuisine is naturally gluten free, due to Arabic/Moorish history, we use mostly rice instead of pasta. Also many restaurants and packaging in Spain now have labels for gluten free (Sin Gluten), as it has become quite trendy for people to go gluten free in Spain.
As for home bases along the Southern coast that covers quite the distance, do you have any specific areas? In addition to the more well known places like Malaga, Cadiz, or even Valencia, I'd say look at more lesser known places that offer a perhaps more authentic local experience like Huelva, Almería, Cartagena, and Alicante.
2 months is a long time to be a tourist resort so you’d probably enjoy a real town or city more. Valencia is great. You could stay near the beach and use public transport to explore the area. It’s has mild, sunny weather.
The first 2 weeks of March are Fallas, a festival in which huge models are built and then burnt with accompanying partying and fireworks.
Menus is Spain indicate allergens and the supermarkets label well. There is a wide range of gluten free food available including cakes etc.
