The little-visited region with the best beaches in Spain

beach costa da morte
beach costa da morte

At a waterside restaurant on the Costa da Morte, in the far north-west corner of the Iberian Peninsula, I sat in the shade of a palm tree listening to the plish-plash of the waves as I made my way through a plate of scallops and a glass or two, or three, of apple-fresh albariño. Mine was one of just three tables for lunch. Across the water, a fishing boat chugged into Corme harbour. It was hard to know whether this sense of easeful quiet was normal, “new normal” or quite uncharacteristic: either way, it was doing me good.

The brand names attached to other bits of Spanish seaside – Sun Coast, White Coast, even Brave Coast (Costas del Sol, Blanca and Brava) – tend to have an attractive ring about them. “Coast of Death”, not so much. In fact, there are good reasons for the off-putting moniker, as I would discover during a recce of this glorious and little-traversed region of Galicia. And if it frightens off the Costa Blanca crowd, I say, so much the better.

As a holiday destination, Costa da Morte was never on most people’s mental GPS, but various things have happened in recent months to make me think a change is imminent. One is our current appetite for hassle-free sojourns in unspoilt natural environments where it’s easy to keep a healthy distance from your fellow man – all boxes that the Costa da Morte, with its vast sweeping beaches and scant human presence, ticks decisively.

Another is the Parador Costa da Morte, which opened mid-pandemic to a rapturous reception and 100 per cent occupancy. Anyone used to the slightly fusty, traditionalist style of Spain’s state-owned Paradores Nacionales will be as blown away by this addition to the chain as by a fresh, salt-laden gust of Atlantic wind, as Isabella Noble points out in her review, opposite.

Muxía - Getty
Muxía - Getty

Along the coast from the parador is the town of Muxía, stuck to the promontory like a limpet on a rock, and its great granite church facing out to the wind and waves – home of a much-venerated local virgin, Our Lady of the Boat. That evening at sundown, I made my way over to the rocks below Our Lady’s church, said by superstitious Gallegos to be the remains of a stone boat in which the Virgin arrived for a meeting with St James. One of these rocks, the table-like Pedra dos Cadris, is believed to provide freedom from back pain, kidney disease and headaches for those who pass underneath it. I crawled under the stone for good measure, no health protection being de trop in these perilous times.

After lunch next day (octopus a feira, with olive oil and paprika, and a rich seafood-based rice at A de Loló in Muxía) I set off northwards along an intricate coastline where wind-whipped rocky outcrops gave way to sheltered inlets, wooded hills and some of the dreamiest beaches I’d seen in 30 years of roaming the Spanish coasts. At times, especially on the lonely peninsulas of Fisterra, Vilán and Touriñán, I picked up an end-of-the-world feeling that reminded me of Cornwall (but with better food and weather). Compared with any of Spain’s better-known costas, this one seemed blissfully empty. There were family-run seaside pensiones, chic cabin complexes and comfortable casas rurales to stay in, yet harbour towns such as Cee and Camelle seemed more preoccupied with shellfish collection and fishing, the life of the sea, than with bigging up a modest tourist sector mainly geared to Spanish staycationers.

Over four days in September, I pottered the 50-odd miles from Muros, at the southern end, to Malpica de Bergantiños in the far north, an hour’s drive from the fine city of A Coruña. If some of the coastal towns were poorly preserved and unprepossessing, others, such as Corcubión and Muxía, had a hard-working seaside charm. Where the road dipped inland, I caught glimpses of rural Galicia in the maize fields and the aroma of eucalyptus spreading from woods, the cows grazing on verdant pasture, and the ubiquitous stone granaries called hórreos, built high on pillars to fool the rats. The village gardens had banks of hydrangeas, whose flowers were the same pale blue as the sky. Wherever I went there was good, simple food to be eaten – the Costa da Morte’s shellfish, and its line-caught local fish, are peerless – and a welcome much more amiable than Galicia’s reputation for suspicion and reserve might have led me to expect.

Muros - Getty
Muros - Getty

As I journeyed, I racked up a shortlist of jaw-dropping beaches where, if the clear turquoise waters might have suggested the Caribbean, their bracing temperature swiftly removed that illusion. Near the top of my list was Rostro, a place of savage loveliness whose powerful currents made it a dangerous beauty. I’ll remember Langosteira, near Fisterra, for the sweet, fresh local razor clams, simply fried in olive oil, that I enjoyed at a beach chiringuito behind the sands. And I almost swerved off the road when I first clapped eyes on the four-mile sweep of Carnota bay, majestic in its sickle-shaped curve, its surrounding landscape of dunes and marshy foreshore perfectly intact.

North of Carnota, the trip turned suddenly wilder and woollier. On the weather-beaten cape of Touriñán I spent a morning with a percebeiro, or collector of percebes (goose barnacles), the expensive shellfish delicacy that is to Spain what oysters are to France. Armed with an iron pick and considerable courage, Santiago lowered himself on to the ragged rocks to chip off the barnacles one by one, always keeping an eye out for the fierce waves that threatened to sweep him away. The risk factor is as high as the price fetched in the market (often as much as €100/£88 per kilo) by these strange shellfish tubes with their leathery skins and pungent sea taste. Accidents are common, and over the years several of his fellow percebeiros had come to grief, confided Santiago.

For behind the dazzle of the Costa da Morte lies a dark side. Beyond the lighthouse at Cabo Vilán, the meandering coast road became a dirt track leading into a huge high-sided bay, the Enseada do Trece, and another of those skid-to-a-halt beaches of white sand and aquamarine water. It was here that the Costa’s forbidding brand name began to make sense to me. Just above the rocks, a stone cemetery, no more than a simple walled corral, contained the remains of the 172 British mariners drowned when their ship, HMS Serpent, ran aground on rocks on the night of Nov 10 1890. The seas around La Coruña have led to the wreck of more than 1,400 ships, making this one of the world’s most treacherous coastlines. The worst of all these disasters was the calamity of the Prestige in 2012, when an oil tanker ran aground off Muxía and hundreds of miles of coastline were coated with a sticky black tide christened locally “el chapapote”.

The lighthouse at Cabo Vilán - Getty
The lighthouse at Cabo Vilán - Getty

At the wide Corme e Laxe estuary, a popular summer-holiday spot for the residents of A Coruña, the Costa da Morte comes to its logical end. Casting off gloomy thoughts of drowning and destruction, I repaired for another of the simple seaside lunches that had featured largely in my explorations of this north-west frontier. The menu today: chargrilled xoubas (baby sardines) and a tin platter of pimientos de Padrón, the baby green peppers of which one in every 10 is a hot one, with a glass of albariño and a basket of chewy-crusty gallego bread, a not unreasonable £9. If you can look beyond the name, and its grim reputation, the Coast of Death is nothing less than life-enhancing.

Overseas holidays are currently subject to restrictions.

Essentials

WHERE TO STAY

Parador Costa da Morte

State-of-the-art design and architecture. Spain’s newest parador (opened in June 2020) is an ideal gateway to the Costa da Morte. Read Telegraph Travel's review. parador.es

A Torre de Laxe

Exceptionally pleasant hotel in an early 20th-century modernista house with extensive gardens overlooking the estuary. Stone outhouses, a dovecote and four new cabins in cool Scandi style provide self-contained accommodation. Doubles from €75 (£66). atorredelaxe.com

Nidos de Carnota

Much sought-after as a socially distanced retreat for couples and families, these cool cabins (opened in April 2019) stand in bucolic surroundings on the hillside above Carnota beach. Cabins from €160. nidosdecarnota.com

Mar do Ezaro

Miguel Mariño and Alesandra Rodeiro’s brand new eight-room hotel, handy for the beach and Ezaro’s famous waterfall, channels Nordic cool in its bright and breezy design scheme. Doubles from €80. hotelmardoezaro.com

WHERE TO EAT

O Semaforo de Fisterra

Fisterra Prime local seafood is the draw at O Semaforo, surely the Costa da Morte’s best restaurant-with-rooms, astoundingly sited in an old lighthouse on the promontory at Fisterra. hotelsemaforode fisterra.com

A de Loló Muxía

A local classic renewed with a bright new interior, “Loló’s place” is a reliable choice for fish, octopus a feira and percebes (goose barnacles). Also, note the list of fine Galician wines. adelolo.com

Mar de Fondo Laxe

Best of the various establishments along the promenade at Laxe, Mar de Fondo offers top-quality shellfish (don’t miss the zamburiñas, a sweetly delicious local scallop) and whole fish on the charcoal grill.