Five towns between Dénia and Alicante

Three separate towns wearing one name — an inland old town, a working port, and a beach strip — with coves between them.

South of Dénia around the Cap de la Nau headland, Xàbia is a strongly international town, and a spread-out one. The old town sits inland, the port a kilometre away, the Arenal beach strip further round again; which one you live in decides what your stay is like.

A whitewashed old town stacked up a hill under a blue-tiled dome, with Benidorm's skyline visible along the bay and nothing else in common with it.

A pretty town, and one often described as artistic, which is accurate and also the whole marketing department. Pebble beaches rather than sand, a steep old town, and a quieter register than its neighbours — Benidorm is ten minutes down the tram line and feels like another country.

A provincial capital with a castle on a rock above it — a working city that happens to have a beach, and the only place on this coast with a mainline railway and a major airport.

The regional hub, and a straightforward place for a first long stay on the Costa Blanca. A city of a few hundred thousand people with its own economy, a university, an airport with routes across Europe and fast trains to Madrid — so the practical questions that dominate the smaller towns mostly do not arise here.