The Costa Tropical will be losing its only sightseeing catamaran, thanks to illogical bureaucratic obstacles – something that is endemic in Granada.

Boatdil was the only daily service, plying backwards and forwards between Motril and La Herradura but has now come to an end because there comes a point when you just give up trying to get anything done, so they’re moving to the Canary Islands.

The straw that broke the camel’s back was the refusal to give them permission to build jetties so that passengers could embark and disembark from beaches. They tried for two years to get the bureaucrats to move but it was just impossible.

Despite this lack of cooperation, the company managed to transport nearly 6,000 passengers a year. The trouble was that the catamaran had to use Motril Port, which has difficult access for passengers, as the wharf is tucked away behind the Yachting Club and for people who don’t know their way around the port, it is difficult to find.

So, the company wanted to build boarding jetties on Salobreña beach next to the Peñón and another one next to the Velilla groyne in Almuñécar.

Whereas Costas and Formento authorities in the city of Granada had the conversational capacity of a brick wall, the Mayor of Salobreña and the Motril Port authorities, on the contrary, did all they could to help.

Anybody who has tried to start a business in the province, by the book, knows what they had to go through. When it comes to attending international tourism fairs around Europe, then the administrative bigwigs are full of “promoting local businesses,” but when it actually comes down to doing it, well…

(News: Costa Tropical, Granada, Andalucia)