El Campanario (campanario exento de Guadalest)

El Campanario, Guadalest's bell tower, stands alone on a rocky outcrop, separate from the Church of Nuestra Señora de la Asunción it belongs to. Seen from the valley or from the reservoir, the tower looks like the prow of a ship suspended over open air, and it's the most reproduced image of the village on postcards and photographs, more so even than the castle itself. Its silhouette is visible clearly from the approach road into the village, even before crossing the tunnel into the citadel, and it's usually the first landmark visitors recognise on arrival.

Why it stands apart from the church

The reason is topographical: the original church stood inside the castle's walled enclosure, in a spot too enclosed and too low for the bells' sound to reach the valley clearly. The solution was to build the tower on the highest open point available, a separate outcrop. Today the bells are rung electrically from inside the church, with no need for anyone to climb the tower itself to make them sound.

The tower has given rise to one of Guadalest's most repeated legends: locals say the bell rings on its own on the eve of St John, on the Night of the Dead, and during periods of severe drought, and that it's the spirit of the village's first bell-ringer, trapped at the base of the tower during the 1644 earthquake. A more down-to-earth explanation points to acoustic resonance created by the tower's own shape under certain wind conditions. The interior isn't open to visitors, but it can be circled and photographed from several points in the citadel and from the Plaça de Sant Gregori viewpoint. Built on a circular plan out of rubble masonry, the tower has withstood the same earthquakes and centuries of coastal wind that repeatedly damaged the church at its foot.