On 12 June 1994, 6,001 people in Palamós walked into a polling station and were asked whether the beach at Castell should be built on. Nearly seven in ten — 4,189 votes, 69.81 per cent — said no. That is why there is a pine wood behind this beach instead of four hundred houses, a hotel and a golf course, and it is why Castell is routinely described as the last large undeveloped beach on the Costa Brava. Every other beach on this coast lost that argument, mostly without ever having it.
The Vote That Made This Beach
Castell had been protected land under a municipal plan dating back to 1959. Then, between 1985 and 1990, Palamós drafted a new general plan, and in it the beach and the flat farmland behind it changed status: from rural land to land programmed for development. Two companies, El Castell SA and Camo SA, brought forward projects. The numbers quoted at the time varied — one project alone was for 181 dwellings, the wider scheme approached four hundred, plus a hotel and a golf course — and the promoters sold it, in the language of the era, as a low-density development that would bring jobs and investment. An earlier attempt by Club Méditerranée had already put the place on people’s radar.
In 1992 a group of residents formed a platform called Salvem Castell. What followed was two years of signature collections, public meetings, scale models on both sides and a genuinely rough campaign — the promoters had money and the ecologists had volunteers. Cornered between the two, the town council did something almost nobody does with a planning decision: it put the question to the town.
The ballot paper asked, in Catalan, whether the residents wanted Castell — the paratge and the plana — to be developable. It was held on the same day as the European Parliament elections, which is how a municipal consultation got a 56.5 per cent turnout from a census of 10,826. The result was not legally binding on anyone. The mayor of the day, Josep Ferrer, had committed to respect it regardless, and on 15 June the council opened the procedure to reclassify the land as non-developable.
That was not the end of it. The promoters appealed, and the case went up through the Catalan high court and finally to the Supreme Court, which confirmed Castell as non-developable. The Generalitat eventually bought out the landowners. The beach and its hinterland now sit inside the Pla Especial Castell–Cap Roig, and the fight itself became a reference point for every Costa Brava conservation campaign since.
If you want to see what the alternative looked like, you do not have to imagine it. Walk twenty-five minutes south along the coastal path to La Fosca, the next beach along, and look at the apartments.
What the Beach Is Like
Big, by the standards of this coast: somewhere between 300 and 375 metres of shoreline depending on who is measuring and how the winter has treated the sand, and 40 to 90 metres deep. It is a clean crescent closed by rock at both ends, with the mouth of the Riera d’Aubi arriving at roughly the middle.
The sand is fine and golden and the slope into the water is gentle — the opposite of the gravel and sudden drop that characterises most of the coves in Begur and Tossa further north. That, plus the size, is why Castell is a genuine family beach rather than a beautiful cove you can barely fit on.
What it does not have is buildings. Behind the sand there is pine, farmland and a few masies, and the services are deliberately minimal and seasonal: lifeguard cover in summer, showers, chemical toilets, ramps, a kayak school and a chiringuito or two. Nothing permanent, nothing in concrete. Bring shade — there is very little of it once you are on the sand.
The bay faces south, which shelters it from the tramuntana but leaves it open to southerlies. In summer those tend to build from around midday, so the flat, clear water is a morning phenomenon here. Early swimmers get visibility good enough to see fish and the seagrass offshore; by four in the afternoon on a windy day it is chop and cloudy water.
The Iberian Town on the Headland
On the rocky promontory closing the north end of the beach sit the walls of an Iberian settlement — Castell de la Fosca, also called Punta del Castell, an oppidum of the Indigetes that appears to have been occupied from around the sixth century BC until the first century AD. It was walled, with two square towers, and its inhabitants were doing exactly what the modern town does: fishing and trading along this coast.
Excavation began in the 1930s and 1940s under Lluís Barceló i Bou and resumed in a new series of campaigns from 2001. What has come out of it is domestic rather than monumental, and better for it: 64 storage pits and two cisterns cut into the rock, imported and locally made amphorae, millstones, lamps, net weights, agricultural tools, coins, and inscriptions in Iberian. The site belongs to the Generalitat, is managed by the Museu d’Arqueologia de Catalunya and is open to walk around.
Go up in the late afternoon. It is a five-minute climb from the sand, the view back down the crescent is the best one there is of this beach, and standing on a two-and-a-half-thousand-year-old wall looking at an undeveloped shoreline is a fairly pointed way to spend ten minutes.
The Coast on Either Side
South of the beach, a short walk brings you to Cala s’Alguer, a fishing hamlet of low barraques painted in blocks of colour, now used as seasonal houses and protected as a cultural asset of national interest. It is one of the few surviving pictures of what this coast looked like before tourism, and it survives partly because people fought for that one too.
North, past the Iberian site, the path reaches Cala Foradada — a small, very clear cove with a sea cave that a kayak can paddle straight through. Keep going and the camí de ronda runs on towards Cala Estreta, the Cap Roig gardens and eventually Calella de Palafrugell. This is one of the finest walking stretches on the whole Costa Brava, shaded for much of the way, and the kayak school on the beach exists largely because the coastline either side of Castell is best seen from the water.
How to Get to Platja de Castell
By Car
From the AP-7, take exit 6 and follow the C-255 towards La Bisbal d’Empordà, then on towards Palamós and the signs past Camping Benelux. The car park is paid in season and sits about five minutes’ walk back from the sand — a deliberate arrangement, since the whole point of the place is that nothing was built next to the beach.
On Foot from La Fosca
The standard local move: park in the streets at La Fosca, if you can find a space, and walk the camí de ronda round in about twenty-five minutes. It is mostly shaded, it costs nothing, and it takes you past the ruins of the Castell de Sant Esteve de Mar on the cliff. It also means you arrive having seen exactly the thing Castell was saved from.
Map
Eating and Sleeping Nearby
On the beach: seasonal chiringuitos, drinks and casual food, enough to get through a day without leaving. That is all there is and all there is going to be.
For a proper meal you go into Palamós, which is not a hardship. This is a working fishing port with a daily auction and a museum of fishing attached to it, and its prawns — gamba de Palamós — are the most famous single ingredient on this coast, with prices to match. Eating them within sight of the boats that landed them is the correct way to end a day at Castell.
Nobody sleeps at the beach, because there is nowhere to sleep. Palamós has the hotels and apartments; La Fosca is the closest developed base and puts you twenty-five minutes away on foot.
When to Go
Castell’s problem now is its own reputation. A beach with no development, no promenade and a small car park has a hard ceiling on how many people it can absorb, and thirty years after the referendum it is being loved fairly hard — high on every online list, packed on August weekends, and with the arrival capacity of a place that was deliberately never built up. The people who saved it say so themselves.
So: June and September, on a weekday, are what this beach is for. Warm water, space on the sand, and the walk to the Iberian site or on towards Cap Roig without queueing for it. In July and August, come early — before ten for the car park, and before midday for the flat water.
Out of season it is arguably better still, if you are walking rather than swimming: pine, empty sand, archaeology and no chiringuito. For how Castell sits against the rest of the region, see our Costa Brava beach rankings.
Practical Tips
- Bring shade and water. No promenade, no permanent buildings, very little natural cover on the sand.
- Swim in the morning. The southerly typically gets up around midday and takes the clarity with it.
- Walk in from La Fosca. Twenty-five shaded minutes, free, and it sets up everything the beach is about.
- Give the Iberian site twenty minutes. It is a short climb at the north end and the best viewpoint over the bay.
- Take your rubbish out with you. This is protected land with minimal servicing — what you leave, stays.
Frequently Asked Questions
Why is Platja de Castell undeveloped?
Because Palamós voted against it. In a local referendum on 12 June 1994, just under 70 per cent of voters rejected making Castell developable, and the council reclassified the land as non-developable. The courts upheld it and the Generalitat later bought out the owners.
Is there really an Iberian site on the beach?
Yes — a walled Iberian settlement on the promontory at the north end, occupied from roughly the sixth century BC to the first century AD, excavated from the 1930s onwards and open to visitors.
Is Castell good for children?
It is one of the best on this coast for them: fine sand, a gentle entry and enough room that a busy day still leaves space.
Can you park at the beach?
There is a paid car park about five minutes’ walk away, and it fills in summer. Parking at La Fosca and walking the coastal path is the usual alternative.
Written for general information, not as travel, legal or safety advice. Castell sits inside a protected area with deliberately minimal infrastructure: services, toilets and lifeguard cover are seasonal and can be absent entirely outside summer, and there is little shade. The bay is exposed to southerly wind, which typically builds through the afternoon. The Iberian settlement is a protected archaeological site — stay on the marked routes and remove nothing. Confirm current details with the Ajuntament de Palamós before travelling.
Image Credits
- Header image: Platja el Castell 05 by Kritzolina, licensed under CC BY-SA 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons.
- In-article image: Barracas de cala Pallerida by Alberto-g-rovi, licensed under CC BY-SA 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons. Shows the barracas at cala Pallerida, not Platja de Castell.
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