From the outside, through the glass, one could observe a disarray of piled cushions and boxes cluttering the floor yesterday. Outside, cleaning products and a few collected umbrellas confirmed a challenging decision that Roberto Daniel Gómez found difficult to embrace: the closure of his establishment, the Bistró and Cafetería Baires Café.
Strategically located opposite Playa Jardín, this was the first business to directly feel the repercussions of the situation at Cala, which has been deemed unsafe for swimming for seven months, due to unidentified fecal discharges.
“It pains me deeply to have to close the business because my wife and I made significant sacrifices to open it, pouring so much love into a place that was truly beautiful. However, I have faced an 80% drop in turnover and simply cannot sustain it,” Roberto shared with this publication.
Starting afresh is nothing new for him or his wife, Rosa Beatriz Cabrera Silva. During the pandemic, the couple managed a restaurant in Santa Cruz that suffered greatly from the consequences of COVID-19. He sold everything he owned and decided to seek new opportunities in Puerto de la Cruz, which, despite pandemic regulations, managed to become a key destination maintaining tourism in a health-conscious manner.
Yet, the situation at Playa Jardín altered everything. “I no longer have the means to reopen, which leaves me with no choice but to work independently. Fortunately, we didn’t employ staff; it was just us,” he clarifies.
Baires Café opened approximately two years ago and attracted hordes of tourists each day. Following the advisory against swimming, its clientele, like other businesses in the vicinity, began to dwindle, coinciding almost perfectly with the decline of beach patrons.
“We noticed people arriving and, upon seeing the tapes and signs recommending against bathing, they left,” he recalls.
He asserts that the City Council has provided no assistance. “After numerous discussions, requests, and paperwork, they offered us a mere thousand euros, yet they intend to charge us over two thousand for the waste collection fee, which I find baffling. I pay around 600 euros yearly in Santa Cruz, ten times less,” he states.
He is the first genuine victim of the closure at Playa Jardín, but he believes he will not be the only one affected in the long run. Established businesses that are “surviving” have been part of the neighbourhood for many years.
This is not his circumstance; although he previously thrived because “we offered a unique product that saw great acceptance, and we had developed a loyal clientele, both locals and visitors from Nordic and German backgrounds, primarily. They expressed their sorrow over Punta Brava’s current plight and their intention to consider the south of the island or other destinations that promise better weather than the cold they experience back home,” Roberto laments.
“They mislead us, they fully understand that opening in summer is not feasible”
The Stop Platform expressed frustration that, since November 2024, no meeting has occurred regarding the Technical Table overseeing the repair work of the Punta Brava submarine emissary. “Last month, they contacted us to inform that the work has yet to be tendered, hence no updates are available,” confirmed its president, Tania Hernández.
She mentioned that the City Council had assured them they would reach out once they had news, yet this has not transpired, “and the work has still not been tendered, which makes it just another unfulfilled promise,” she criticises.
Hernández recalls the mayor, Leopoldo Afonso, claimed that the beach would be open for swimming by summer and considers it “another deception for the citizens because he knows perfectly that this will not materialise, considering the works have a projected duration of 16 months and have not even commenced.”
