Two crewed catamarans, both priced at €6,550 a week, and they are not in the same place. One is at Marina de las Salinas at San Pedro del Pinatar, which is genuinely in Murcia on the edge of the Mar Menor. The other is at Puerto Deportivo de Altea, which is in Alicante province in the Valencian Community, about 150 kilometres up the coast. The region label puts them together; geography does not. Check which one you are enquiring about before you book flights.
Both are configured the same way and it is unusual: 12.5 metres with five cabins. That is a cabin-charter layout, so confirm whether you are buying the whole boat or a berth on it.
The Murcian end is the more distinctive water. The Mar Menor is Europe's largest saltwater lagoon — about 170 square kilometres, separated from the Mediterranean by a 22-kilometre sandbar called La Manga, with a handful of narrow channels through it. It is shallow throughout, warmer than the open sea, and completely sheltered. It has also been under serious ecological strain for years from agricultural runoff, with major fish die-offs, and restoration is ongoing; that is part of the honest picture of sailing there.
Outside the lagoon, Cabo de Palos and the Islas Hormigas form a marine reserve with the best diving on this coast, and the coast south toward Mazarrón is dry, cliffy and far less built than the Costa Blanca above it.
From Altea the water is open Mediterranean under the Sierra Helada, with Benidorm's towers and the island of Benidorm a few miles south, and the Peñón de Ifach at Calpe to the north — a 332-metre rock rising straight out of the sea and the landmark of that coast.
Spanish rules apply, though with both boats crewed no certificate is required of you. Season April to October.
