Sorbas Guide

Sorbas is a small town in Almeria, in the Andalusia region of southern Spain, and it feels like nowhere else you will visit on this coast. The streets are whitewashed and quiet, folded into sun-baked hills that stay dry and pale for most of the year. Sorbas is best known for the vast underground cave system hiding beneath those hills.

What lies beneath Sorbas is the real headline: more than a thousand cave entrances make this one of the best examples of gypsum karst anywhere in the world. Water has carved these chambers over millions of years, filtering slowly through soft gypsum rock. Three million years ago this whole area sat under the Mediterranean Sea, and the caves still hold fossils from that vanished coastline.

Inside the protected area you can go caving and join a guided visit, and the basic route takes between an hour and a half and two hours. Your helmet lamp catches thousands of tiny gypsum crystals along the corridors, and deeper rooms reveal stalactites, stalagmites, strange gypsum balls and coral-like formations. Some galleries even hide underground lakes and rivers. Take the basic tour first before you think about anything more demanding.

If that whets your appetite, Sorbas has routes for the bold too. The Cueva del Agua is the longest explored system here, with more than eight kilometres of mapped galleries, and there is a technical route reserved for experienced cavers. Cueva del Tesoro is another of the catalogued caves worth knowing by name before you book anything.

Back in the daylight, Sorbas trades caves for clay. This is the main pottery centre of the province, a living craft that still pulls in visitors who want to watch it happen. At Juan Simon's workshop, red clay gets worked into kitchenware and decorative pieces, including jugs shaped like a cockerel. Step inside and watch the wheel turn before you decide what to buy.

And the sea? Sorbas itself has no beach, so do not come expecting one. The Levante beaches around Mojacar and Garrucha, and the Cabo de Gata-Nijar Natural Park, sit about 40 kilometres away, an easy day trip rather than a walk from your door. Sorbas stays the calm, dusty place you come back to once the sand has been shaken out of your shoes.