Tabernas desert

Towns, Villages & Places of Interest - Tabernas Desert

The Tabernas desert lies to the north of the town of Almería between the mountains of Los Filabres and Alhamilla and is approximately 45 minutes drive from Garrucha. Occupying some 11,625 hectares this natural area is considered to be the only true desert in the whole of the European continent.

The scenery is startling and the annual rainfall here does not exceed 25mm, with the year-round average temperature over 17 degrees centigrade.

The peculiarity of the desert, with more than 3.000 hours of sun yearly, has made possible the installation of a Centre of Solar Energy (One of the biggest in Spain).

In the desert only plants known as xerophytes (plants like cactus, that are able to live in very dry places) or parasitic plants grow. Salt cedar and oleander do grow in some dry gullies, however, and brushwood grows where it can find nitrogen-rich soil.

The Tabernas Desert has very similar landscape, vegetation & fauna, to those a few kilometres across the Mediterranean sea in North Africa.

No wonder that Italian director Sergio Leone made the so-called Spaghetti westerns, starring the young American actor Clint Eastwood, here in the mid 60's. Films like Indiana Jones, King of Kings, The Good the Bad and the Ugly, Conan and the Peter O’Toole classic, Lawrence of Arabia, were all filmed in this desert area.

The making of these films and stars like Clint Eastwood, Raquel Welch, Peter O'Toole and Charles Bronson, to name but a few, gave rise to the name of "Mini Hollywood", this name is still used today to refer to this arid area.

Mini Hollywood

The original film set site has been opened up to the public and although there are still some original film sets about they are in very dilapidated condition. Some have now been rebuilt and fun Wild West shows are performed two/three times a day on a daily basis for the tourists who are bussed up from the coastal resorts.

Click on image to enlarge - use back button to return to this page

You can easily spend a day here as besides the three shows, Can-Can dancers, Parrot and Wild West, that are performed at various times during the day there is also a large natural reserve and Zoo with giraffes, lions, ostriches, bears, etc. that will take two/three hours to wander around.

The area, although hilly, is accessible to wheelchair and pushchair users but you may struggle to get round some of the natural reserve areas.

The entrance fee as of April 2005 was 17 Euro per adult and 9 Euro per child - not sure if a family ticket is available. All the shows are included in the entrance fee and food and drinks are available at reasonable prices.

Opening times are around 10:00am but closing times vary according to season - about 9:00pm in the summer.

TIP As this is classified as a desert area it can get very hot so take reasonable precautions to avoid sunburn, heat exhaustion etc. i.e. sun lotion, hat and ensure you drink plenty - advise not beer or spirits.