The concept of beach-bars in Spain dates from the beginning of the 20th century, and since then they have become a standard feature of most Spanish beaches. Known as ‘chiringuitos’, they provide something for everybody wishing to spend a day on the beach, whether it be a glass of cold beer or wine, a delicious sea-food lunch or a night of wild dancing under the stars. But strict compliance with the Ley de Costas, whose most controversial articles pertain to buildings on or close to the beaches, could spell the end of the beach-bar as we know and love it.

Coasts Law

Most foreign home owners in Spain, especially those who have purchased a house close to the beach, are already familiar with the Ley de Costas, and many of us who live on the Costa del Sol know somebody who could be affected by it. The same law is now a source of worry to owners of beach-bars along the entire coastline, because by definition, a beach-bar is actually on a beach, and in most cases, is now there illegally. There are provisions by which a beach-bar may be allowed to remain more or less in place: if it occupies a surface area of 150 square metres or less, if it is located at a minimum of 200 metres from another beach-bar, and if it is taken off the sand and re-located on the esplanade. This last provision is causing most controversy. A beach-bar can hardly be so named if it is not on a beach.

There is not much the beach-bar owners can do about it, but they are trying. Unfortunately for them, most of their licences have run out and need to be renewed, and this will not happen unless they can negotiate a solution with the state.

“The high season is around the corner and the situation is depressing,” says Miguel Arrabal, president of the Association of Beach Businesspeople. He tells us that 300 of the 400 beach-bars along the 143 kilometres of Malaga coastline do not have licences. One of them is on the La Malagueta beach in Malaga City, where the Ministry for the Environment is carrying out sand recuperation work on the beach. “But the licences needed to set up beach-bars there, although promised, have not yet been granted,” says Arrabal. The situation is the same in Estepona, where beach-bar owners are being forced to pay back grants they have received from the Junta de Andalucía, interest included, because they have not been granted licences.

The situation has reached a point where the government sub-delegate, Hilario López Luna, has had to intervene as a negotiator between the beach-bar owners, the Town Halls and the Ministry. He told SUR that he intended to help resolve the problem by use of article 60 of the Ley de Costas, which states that “occupation of public land (i.e. the beach) may be permitted in cases in which certain activities, by their nature, cannot be carried out in any other space.” There is also, he adds, specific mention in this article of the special nature of beach-bars in Andalucía.

Protests planned

So are the days of strolling across the sand dressed only in a swimsuit for a cool drink in a beach-bar coming to an end? The answer will come out of the current negotiations between the Town Halls and the state, and each case, we are assured, will be decided on its own merits. Meanwhile the owners are struggling to survive, demanding 150 square metres of bar space and 100 square metres of terrace. If their demands are not met, they will take to the streets in protest, warns the president of their association, Miguel Arrabal.

It would indeed mean a radical change in beach culture if the traditional beach-bars were to disappear from the sand. Their origins go back to the early tourists arriving on Malaga’s beaches in the nineteen twenties. Before that time, it had not occurred to most ordinary Andalusians to spend the day on the beach, while the wealthy middle classes of the day preferred to take refuge from the heat of the summer sun in their country houses, far from the beaches. As we all now know, the crazy foreigners’ love of the beach caught on, and makeshift bars were soon erected on the sand to feed and water this new breed. As Malaga journalist Francisco Lancha tells us, the first beach-bar in the region was on the La Malagueta beach, owned by Malaga businessman Antonio Martín. He served no less than King Alfonso XIII and Queen Victoria Eugenia, who had come to Malaga to inaugurate the Príncipe de Asturias Hotel in the Miramar Palace in 1926. His beach-bar still stands – for the moment.

Casa Pedro, an institution

Another beach-bar was opened in the nineteen twenties on the beach at El Palo, named Casa Pedro, and shortly afterwards an open-air restaurant was opened on the spot, using palm leaves as shade from the sun, says Lorenzo Martínez, a member of the original owner’s family. All went well until 1989, when the Ley de Costas forced them to move to the esplanade. They soon ran up a huge debt that has still not been paid off, and are now resigned to closing for good.

‘Espetos’

The Manzano family turned their own house on the beach in Huelín into the famous María beach-bar in the nineteen forties. They were the first to spear fresh sardines with rods of cane and roast them over an open fire, and so a new dish, now synonymous with the beach, was born.

Since those far-off days, as small villages along the Malaga coast became international holiday resorts, beach-bars were built in their hundreds. We have all enjoyed them, but from now on, if the law refuses to bend, we may be forced to fuel our bodies on esplanades instead.