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Alicante is exceptionally well connected to the rest of the world with first class
roads, rail and air connections.
Many people drive down, either enjoying a trip through France, or taking the ferry to Santander or Bilbao and driving down through Spain.
The roads in the
Alicante region are first class - the Mediterranean coast motorway (and A7, or AP7) runs from Barcelona all the way to Gibralter and passes straight past Alicante.
When it's the AP7, you have to pay, when it'sthe plain old A7, it's free. In Alicante, going north toward Benidorm, the toll booths appear soon after Sant Joan, and going south, to Murcia is free, but toward Cartagena is toll.
The other main road is the Madrid motorway, the A31 which goes directly from the heart of Alicante, up past Monovar, Elda, Sax and Villena into Albacete, Cuenca and then Madrid, about four hours
drive from Alicante itself.
New toll motorways have opened meaning that you can choose to pay or not to pay, depending which motorway you choose, and really the A31/A3 is perfectly good enough without the need to pay for the new links.
A major flagship project for the region is the AVE high speed rail link.
Already the region is well linked by train to Barcelona, Madrid and Murcia, but the new link will cut times to the capital to only two hours.
Most visitors arrive in Alicante via the airport, the
seventh busiest in all of Spain. Last year the airport dealt with nearly 9 million passengers!
The airport is exceptionally well connected with the rest of Europe, especially the UK - you can fly
directly to Alicante on a scheduled flight from four of London's airports (Heathrow, Gatwick, Stanstead and Luton) as well as Belfast, Birmingham, Blackpool, Bournemouth, Bristol, Cardiff, Doncaster,
Edinburgh, Exeter, Glasgow, Leeds-Bradford, Liverpool, Manchester, Newcastle, Norwich, Nottingham East Midlands, Southampton and Teesside. There are also direct flights from Cork and Dublin in the
Republic of Ireland - and these are just the scheduled flights!
Not many sunny destinations are as well connected with the UK and Ireland, and at a flight time of just over two hours, and many low
cost airlines now servicing the airport (including EasyJet, Jet2 and BMI), getting to and from Alicante could not be easier.
Click here for a full list of Alicante Airport connections.
The airport is comfortable and modern, but not large. It is well served wth shops and restaurants and the arrivals hall has a 24 hour pharmacy. Most of the shops are airside, there is
very little on the landside of the airport. Those shops include Divers (regional produce and chocolates), Gran Bouquet (food), Panama Jack, Gonzalo Comella, Shop in Store and Springfield (all
clothing), Luxor and Perla del Sur (jewelry), Crystal Music (music) and Relay (newspapers and magazines). For restaurants there is the Bill Bentley pub, Hagaan Daz, two cafeterias and a Burger King.
The airport is being expanded with an ambitious new terminal which is due to open in 2009 - this huge new building, currently visible only by the forest of red and white cranes to the right as
you drive out of the airport car park, will be an impressive open, light and airy terminal with many more facilities and space for many more flights - meaning that there's a lot of confidence in the
future of this lovely corner of the Mediterranean.
It is not far from the terminal to the car parks and bus stops, but unfortunately there isn't yet a train, although there is talk of putting in a
spur link to the Elche-Alicante line which passes the side of the airport perimeter. The best option for most people is to hire a car, and there are nine different companies with offices in the
terminal building, just in the arrivals hall.
Getting out of the airport is simple - just take it slowly and follow the signs.
Most routes are well signposted as either south toward Murcia or north toward Valencia (and Madrid). Spanish drivers are not known for their patience, but nor are they that bad, they might use the horn a little more than we do back in the UK, but, as anyone will tell who has driven in Spain, it's really much nicer than navigating the traffic clogged motorways back home.
If you're coming on an Advanta Homes inspection trip, don't worry about all of this as we'll meet you at the airport and take you straight to your hotel where you can relax and start to enjoy
your stay.
If you have any questions about getting to Alicante, please send us an email at info@advantahomes.com
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