Coastal Battery at Cape de Santa Pola
Build on the top of bluff which overlooks Santa Pola and Ilsa Tabaca, close to the light house
We visited the area today 10/06/2026 with our Wednesday walking group. I have been before, way back before we bought our house out here, some eleven years ago.
Things have changed a little and there is a lot of reconstruction going on, but you can still walk around the site outside the closed off area.
The battery was designated No10 of the Southern Coastal Defence Group on November 7 1937
The site consits of two large sunken circular gun emplacements and several smaller emplacements plus a couple of bunkers and buildings. The site is easily accessable by road directly from the N332, but also via walking/cycling routes from both Santa Pola and Gran Alicant. There are several notice boards and information plaques all in English, Spanish and Valenciano
Site map
The barracks, guard bunker and cookhouse
Period photo of the barracks
These photos of the main reconstuction area today, looks like they are replacing the rooves on the barracks and cookhouse buildings
Guard bunker
Behind the former cookhouse there is also a concrete cistern
The general plan was the battery garrison would be housed in the barracks and the lighthouse buildings.
The battery was equipped with two Krupp 150mm model 1875 guns, these old cannon only had a maximum range of some 7,500 meters, hardly state of the art!
The guns were each mounted in a 6 meter circular gun pit in defilade, so invisible from the sea. Each pit was conected by a tunnel to an underground ammunition bunker. Fire control was commanded from a concrete bunker to the rear via telephone, I assume there were spotter positions along the cliffs who would feed back directional information on potential targets!
Gun emplacement 1
Gun Emplacement 2
Entrance to the ammunition bunker
Command/control bunker
There are also several smaller emplacements around the site for anti-aircraft guns, these guns were not just to protect the battery itself but acted as a anti-aircraft defence for the approaches to Alicante.
76.2mm AA guns of the type believed to have been emplaced around the battery
Post 1
Information poster
Post 2
Post 3
Information board
Thanks for the pics. Nicely presented too with lots of info & pics. The only shame is the amount of graffiti.
ReplyDeleteIt was nice to revisit after such a long time. Yes the graffiti is a pain, but I assume they will clean the bunker as part of what they are doing to the barracks, etc (maybe they`ll do the gun pits too??).
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