Night Life in Benidorm

If you’re about to pack a suitcase for Benidorm which includes any of the following items: bedtime reading, hot chocolate sachets, alarm clock, tartan slippers – stop now, cancel your ticket and book a week in Bournemouth instead. The city that never sleeps, Benidorm is the ideal venue for clubbers, festival goers, dancers, drinkers and party animals of every age and persuasion.

British night owls who like to stick together with birds of a feather should take the ‘as the crow flies’ path to La Calle Mallorca where Heavy Metal, Indie Rock, soul, RnB and Tamla blasts out from the live bands, DJ decks and Karaoke mikes of the endless Brit bars that line the streets.

Less frenetic and more laid back are the many excellent people-watching bars around the old town where you can linger over your  wine in the close heat of the night. And if you’re beginning to despair that you’re ever going to hear anything Spanish in Benidorm, make your way to La Calle Esperanto where the young mainlanders go to hear bars playing more traditional Spanish music.

Somewhere in the middle of the two extremes of audience participation in the nightlife, are the bars along the Avenida fronting Playa Levante and Playa Poniente where you’ll find a mix of live bands and juke boxes providing the soundtrack to accompany the beach and sea view.

The biggest and best of the nightclubs are at the entrance to the town where clubs like KU, Penelope and KM provide the sounds from around €20 entrance fee which includes a drink. Optional extras such as private striptease at KU will cost you dear. The little brother venues of the same clubs front Playa Levante, and clubbers begin here before graduating to the out of town venues as the night, or rather the morning, progresses.

Festival goers may find themselves return visitors to Benidorm and the resort’s annual Low Cost Festival which showcases predominantly Spanish Indie Rock bands and keeps the stages rocking all night and well into the following morning. Gays will find a lively night scene in the old quarter around the ‘pink district’ where bars and clubs proudly display their rainbow emblems.

Of course, you don’t have to leave your hotel to find night life in Benidorm. Walk along any street and you’ll catch the strains of Achy, Breaky Heart and Super Trouper nightly emanating from the interminable keyboards of hotel cabaret acts.

Andrea (Andy) Montgomery is a freelance travel writer and co-owner of Buzz Trips and The Real Tenerife series of travel websites. Published in The Telegraph, The Independent, Wexas Traveller, Thomas Cook Travel Magazine, EasyJet Traveller Magazine, you can read her latest content on Google+