Salitre

Águilas

Get to know Águilas

Twenty-six monuments, museums and places with a history, grouped by the thread each one pulls on.

Panoramic view of the coastline and town of Águilas

The Salitre journal

A closer look at Águilas

Ideas for choosing where to stay, exploring the coast and finding your next activity. Our first series of guides is in Spanish.

See all guides

The seven museums

For a windy day, a rainy one, or three in the afternoon in August.

Opening days and times change, and one of these places has moved. Worth checking before you go.

Towers and fortifications

For centuries this coast was watched from above, and you can still see why.

  • The port of Águilas at sunset, with moored boats and San Juan castle on its rock

    Monument

    Castillo de San Juan de las Águilas

    It crowns the town eighty-five metres above the sea. There are three parts: the San Juan fort, the San Pedro battery and a passage linking two small forts that defended the climb. From the top you can make out the street plan of the original town, over towards Plaza de España.

    XVIII century · 85 m high

  • Monument

    Torre de Cope

    A watch and defence tower, rebuilt on sixteenth-century ruins in the bay of Cope. It was destroyed and raised again many times: its history is the history of this coast.

    XVI century

Iron and the railway

Iron, lead and silver left Águilas by train and by ship. The landscape still shows it.

  • The Hornillo pier silhouetted against an orange sunset sky, with Isla del Fraile to the right

    Monument

    Embarcadero del Hornillo

    An iron ore loading pier opened in 1903 over the bay of Hornillo by the English company The Great Southern of Spain Railway. Ore left from here for the ships. Today you can walk the old tracks, the unloading tunnel and the viewpoint.

    1903

  • Monument

    Chimenea de la Loma

    Built in 1843 to vent the smoke from the large lead and silver foundries. It is what remains standing of that industry.

    1843

  • Monument

    Monumento al Ferrocarril

    One of the first steam locomotives to run in Águilas, on rails and a plinth in a square in the centre. The town dedicated it to the railway for what the railway brought.

  • Museum

    Museo del Ferrocarril

    In the late nineteenth century these premises were the archive and strongroom of The Great Southern of Spain Railway. Its reinforced iron door is still in perfect condition.

What lies beneath

First-century baths under a block of flats, and finds that reach back to the Neolithic.

  • Monument

    Termas Romanas

    Beneath a building on calle Rey Carlos III, part of the caldarium — the hot baths — of a first-century Roman bath house is preserved in place.

    I century AD

  • Museum

    Museo Arqueológico

    It runs through the history of the municipality from the Neolithic, with the finds from cave C-6 at Cabo Cope, to the present day. The Roman archaeology collection is the fullest part.

The city it built itself

What the town built for itself between the nineteenth century and today.

  • Monument

    Casino de Águilas

    Built between 1894 and 1895. Inside there are ten allegorical paintings signed in 1905 by José Sánchez of Murcia, a pupil of Wssel de Guimbarda of Cartagena.

    1894 to 1895

    By: José Sánchez · Wssel de Guimbarda

  • Monument

    Parroquia de San José

    Nineteenth century, in a restrained neoclassical style. It holds the image of the Virgen de los Dolores, patron of the town, from the school of Francisco Salzillo.

    XIX century

    By: Francisco Salzillo

  • A whitewashed windmill with its sails in place, at the top of a stone stairway

    Monument

    Molinos de Sagrera y Los Alacranes

    Two disused flour mills reached along narrow streets. They grind nothing now and are still part of the Águilas skyline.

  • Garden

    Glorieta de la Plaza de España

    An 1874 garden with a wide variety of trees and plants, among them its centuries-old ficus. At its centre, a fountain with a sculpture everyone here calls «La Pava de la Balsa».

    1874

  • Building

    Auditorio y Palacio de Congresos

    It completes the seafront promenade on the bay of Levante. It hosts concerts, exhibitions and conferences.

  • Building

    Casa de la Cultura «Francisco Rabal»

    It brings together the «Manuel Coronado» exhibition hall, the municipal library, the main hall, several multi-purpose rooms and the «José Matrán» museum room. It holds the awards of the actor Francisco Rabal and those of his daughter Teresa.

Everything facing the water

The harbour, the lighthouse and a rock shaped like a beak.

  • Monument

    Puerto Pesquero

    Opened in 1884, and with it began the commercial revival of Águilas. It has an exhibition on the history of fishing and its own promenade, the fishermen's.

    1884

  • The Águilas lighthouse, banded black and white, with the rock of the headland behind

    Monument

    Faro de Punta Negra

    A cylindrical tower with black and white bands on the slope below the castle, beside the fishing harbour. Thirty point nine metres above sea level, with a range of fifteen nautical miles.

    30.9 m high · 15 nautical miles

  • Museum

    CIMAR, Centro de Interpretación del Mar

    An interpretation centre devoted to the natural heritage of the Águilas coast and to the fishing tradition. There is a real boat mounted on its façade.

  • Viewpoint

    Pico y Mirador de L’Aguilica

    A rock that sea and wind have left shaped like an eagle's beak leaning out over the water.

The Carnival

The town's main festival has both a monument and a museum of its own.

  • A dancer in the Águilas Carnival parade, wearing a headdress of red and turquoise feathers and a sequinned costume

    Monument

    Ícaro, Monumento al Carnaval

    A winged bronze figure by the Murcian sculptor González Beltrán. It is the town's tribute to its most important festival.

    By: González Beltrán

  • Museum

    Museo del Carnaval

    Inside the Casa de la Cultura, it gathers what sets the Águilas Carnival apart, declared a festival of International Tourist Interest in 2015.

    2015

People from here

An actor, a craftsman, and two men who came back from Scotland with a football.

  • El Hornillo loading pier at sunset, the sun going down over the sea and Isla del Fraile in silhouette behind

    Monument

    Rincón del Hornillo

    A broad mosaic stairway facing Hornillo beach, handmade on the initiative of its creator, Juan Martínez «Casuco».

    By: Juan Martínez «Casuco»

  • Monument

    Monumento a Francisco Rabal

    In Cuesta de Gos, the hamlet where the actor was born. Águilas dedicated it to him after his death.

  • Museum

    Centro de Interpretación Francisco Rabal

    One hundred and fifty-nine square metres on the first floor of the Casa de la Cultura, telling the actor's career in an accessible way. Designed by Javier Esquiva with Diana Jusdado and Santa-Cruz Arquitectura.

    159 m²

    By: Javier Esquiva · Diana Jusdado · Santa-Cruz Arquitectura

  • Museum

    Museo del Esparto

    Next to the Sagrera mill, it tells what esparto grass has always meant in the municipality, at work and at festival time. From there you see the whole bay of Levante.

  • Museum

    Museo del Fútbol

    Around 1896 Ginés García Abellán of Águilas, «El Monteruo», and the Edinburgh merchant John Gray Watson arrived from Scotland with a football. That is where the game started here. The El Rubial ground dates from 1913.

    1896

    By: Ginés García Abellán «El Monteruo» · John Gray Watson

  • Monument

    Escaleras y rincones pintorescos

    Stairways and corners painted by local artists, scattered across different parts of the town.

And the sea

Thirty-seven beaches and coves, compared one by one: sand or shingle, wind, how busy they get and which ones take dogs.

See the beaches

To walk, dive and ride

Forty-one snorkelling, diving, hiking and cycling routes along the coast and inland.

See the experiences

Source

The dates, measurements and names on this page come from the guide «Águilas Espectacular», published by the Águilas Tourist Office, March 2026 edition. The texts are rewritten, not copied.

The photographs come from Salitre's own archive. None is from the brochure.

A pebble beach at dusk, the sea flat calm and San Juan castle lit up in the distance

Stay close to all of this

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