Atlantic coastal castles — from Tarifa to Cadiz and the Guadalquivir mouth

• La Caleta — the small city beach in Cadiz. Santa Catalina stands at one end, San Sebastian on the islet at the other, joined by a causeway.
• Essex — the Earl of Essex led the Anglo-Dutch sack of Cadiz in 1596. Philip II ordered the new sea forts after that raid.
• Sancti Petri — the island off Chiclana and San Fernando. A castle sits on the site of an ancient temple to Melqart, later called Hercules.

Start here. Cadiz is a peninsula. After 1596 the crown rebuilt the seaward face. Santa Catalina, designed by Cristobal de Rojas, is a star fort on the north side of La Caleta, begun in 1598 and finished in 1621. It later served as a military prison and is now a cultural space. Walk the ramparts for the Atlantic, not for furnished royal rooms.

San Sebastian sits on the islet at the other end of the same beach. A Muslim watchtower stood here first; the castle was raised in 1706; a causeway now keeps it reachable at high tide; the iron lighthouse dates from 1908. Puertas de Tierra is the landward wall that still marks the old city gate. Cortadura and the smaller bastions along the isthmus are extras if you like military engineering. Give Cadiz a night if you can. The two Caleta forts are the visit.

• Castle of Santa Catalina — map
• Castle of San Sebastian — map
• Puertas de Tierra — map

Tarifa is the southern tip of mainland Europe and the hinge of the Strait road. The castle of Guzman el Bueno is older than Cadiz’s star forts: a tenth-century fortress looking at Morocco. The defence of 1294 and the walk on the walls are told on the frontier route and again with the Islamic layer on the Cadiz Islamic page. On this outing it is the Atlantic gate: stop if you come via Algeciras; do not retell the whole hill line here.

• Castle of Guzman el Bueno — map
• Puerta de Jerez, Tarifa — map

El Puerto de Santa Maria holds San Marcos, a fortress-church on a mosque. The mihrab and that layering are the subject of the Islamic Cadiz page. Here it is the bay stop between Cadiz and the river mouth. Doña Blanca, on the road toward Jerez, is little more than a tower now.

Sancti Petri is the castle on its own island, off Chiclana and San Fernando. The site is older than the fort: Phoenicians had a temple to Melqart here; the Romans called the god Hercules. The watchtower is the oldest standing piece; the walls you see are largely eighteenth-century. You reach it by boat. San Romualdo, near the Zuazo bridge in San Fernando, is the mainland keep on the same defensive line.

Conil keeps the Torre de Guzman and a string of coastal towers — Castilnovo, El Puerco, Roche. Zahara de los Atunes has its own castle by the tuna shore. These are short stops if you are already on the Costa de la Luz between Tarifa and Cadiz, not a substitute for the city forts.

• Castle of San Marcos, El Puerto — map
• Castle of Doña Blanca — map
• Castle of Sancti Petri — map
• Castle of San Romualdo — map
• Torre de Guzman, Conil — map
• Castle of Zahara de los Atunes — map

Where the Guadalquivir meets the Atlantic the Guzman family left houses that still read as castles. Sanlucar de Barrameda has Santiago, on the scarp of the Barrio Alto, and San Salvador nearer the river mouth. Chipiona’s castle stands at the edge of the town toward the sea. Rota’s Castillo de Luna, raised on an older ribat, is now the town hall. See one of these if you are already tasting manzanilla in Sanlucar. They do not replace Cadiz or Tarifa.

• Castle of Santiago, Sanlucar — map
• Castle of Chipiona — map
• Castle of Luna, Rota — map

Huelva’s beaches have watchtowers — Punta Umbria, the line at Matalascanas (San Jacinto, Zalabar, Carbonera) — more than furnished castles. Ayamonte’s fortress was pulled down; the Parador stands on the site. Torre Canela remains on the island. Cartaya’s keep and the Columbus monasteries at La Rabida and Moguer are on the Huelva castles and Columbus route, not repeated here.

• Torre Canela, Ayamonte — map
• Castle of the Zuniga, Cartaya (entrance is closed) — map