Experience
What it's like
Sixteen hours a day, the same ship does three completely different jobs.
Since 2002
Long enough that people come back with their children.
Astral opened in 2002 and has not moved since. In a resort where bars turn over every couple of seasons, that is the unusual part — more unusual, arguably, than the ship.
The result is a room that isn't aimed at one crowd. On any given evening the deck has couples on a first drink, families eating fruit out of a shared XXL glass, regulars who have been coming for a decade, and people who simply walked past, looked up and came in.
Three ways to use it
Pick your hour.
Morning
Coffee, fresh orange or pineapple juice, a shaded table on the upper deck before Banús fills up. The quietest the ship gets.
Afternoon into evening
The hour the light is best on the top deck. A long frozen cocktail, the marina below, nobody rushing you. This is when most people take the photograph.
Night
Lanterns, red rigging, music, every table on the deck taken. Still a cocktail bar rather than a club — you can hear the person opposite you.
The bar
The drink is made in front of you, and it takes a while.
A single cocktail here can involve a sorbet, a house syrup, three fresh juices and a garnish that is assembled on a skewer like a small piece of joinery.
Some arrive under a cloche full of smoke. Some arrive with a cinnamon stick on fire next to them. One arrives in a nest. None of that is on the drink for its own sake — it is how those drinks are served here, and it is a large part of why the bar is busy.
If you can't choose, say what you like and let the bar decide. It is the thing they are best at.
Themed nights come and go — the bunting changes, the ship doesn't. Instagram is the quickest way to see what is on this week.
Good for
Most of the reasons people end up here.
- A drink with a view
- The upper deck looks over the marina and back towards the hills.
- Somewhere different
- If you want one place in Marbella that isn't like anywhere else, this is the easy answer.
- Groups
- The XXL cocktails are built to be shared, with two straws and a lot of fruit.
- An afternoon stop
- Shade, juice, coffee and a seat, right where the marina starts.
- Not drinking
- A full virgin list made with the same fruit and the same effort.
- Showing someone Banús
- It is the first thing most visitors photograph, and it's a two-minute walk from the quayside.