Things to do in Ashdod

Nature · The full western edge of the city

Kilometres of unusually wide, clean sand backed by a continuous promenade, with the Lido and Riviera beaches at the busy end and quieter dunes to the south.

Local tip: The city's beaches are wider than Tel Aviv's and a fraction as crowded, which is the single most persuasive argument for living here. Go at dusk on a weekday when the whole city is out walking it.

Landmark · Southern Ashdod, above the port

The highest point in the city, a dune-top with a lighthouse and a tomb traditionally associated with the prophet Jonah, looking straight down over the port cranes and the coast.

Local tip: This is the vantage point that explains the city: the port, the industrial zone, the residential quarters and the dunes all visible at once. Best in the late afternoon with the light behind you.

Culture · Central Ashdod

A serious contemporary art museum in a purpose-built centre, with a programme that punches far above what a port city of this size would normally sustain.

Local tip: Check what is on before you assume you know what a municipal museum means here. The MonArt centre also runs studios and classes, and it is one of the easier ways into the city's cultural life as a newcomer.

Landmark · On the shore south of the marina

The ruins of an early-Islamic coastal fortress on the dunes, on a site occupied since the Bronze Age — the ancient Ashdod that the modern city took its name from.

Local tip: Almost nobody visits, which is most of the appeal. Walk out from the tayelet at the end of the day; the walls are best photographed with the sea behind them.

Culture · Eastern edge, beside the Lachish stream

A green park on the Lachish where the Egyptian advance was halted in 1948, with the old bridge, an Australian soldiers' memorial from the First World War, and the railway station beside it.

Local tip: It doubles as the city's picnic and cycling park and as its main railway station, so it is both the nicest bit of green in Ashdod and the place you will actually spend time waiting for a train.

Culture · Performing across the city's venues

A full orchestra dedicated to the Andalusian and Judeo-Moroccan repertoire, founded on the strength of the community that built this city, and a national institution based here.

Local tip: Go once even if the repertoire means nothing to you. It is the clearest possible statement of where a large part of Ashdod came from, and the audience is half the experience.