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Malaga during Semana Santa - should I go or choose somewhere else?

Posted by (Pacific Northwest) on

I need to be in Cordoba to start a RS tour on April 5. I was planning on spending 4 nights in Malaga beforehand.

I travel a lot - but I'm new to solo travel. This will be my second Europe trip that I take alone.

I've booked a room at the Only You and plan to spend the 3 days seeing most of the museums. I will walk between sites.

I've watched videos and see that it's quite crowded. I've done Amsterdam on King's Day - due to a continuing "gift" for booking myself into cities on big holidays. Amsterdam on King's Day was fine - but I didn't love walking between sites in those massive crowds.

For anyone who has done Malaga on Holy Week - did you enjoy it? Were the crowds too much?

I can still re-route myself at this point. I could do Valencia, which has been on my list for a long time.

I'm already doing the RS Andalusia tour, then right up to Madrid, Barcelona, Cuenca, and Bilbao on a Road Scholar tour.

Is there another city I should consider? It needs to be a reasonable transit by train or bus - say 6 hours - to get me to Cordoba on April 5th.

Thanks!!!!

Posted by
3253 posts

I think Valencia will be even more crowded than Malaga. If you really are worried about crowds but still want to be in a city rather than a town, pick Barcelona or another city in Catalunya, where people tend to be less religious.

Posted by
29835 posts

But Barcelona seems to be a zoo just about every day of the year (I do love the city, though). I can't imagine it would be less crowded than Malaga. I admit I was in Malaga after Holy Week rather than during Holy Week, however, and my trip was in 2019.

Posted by
15840 posts

I spent the first few days of Semana Santa in Malaga. I spent hours watching the processions and still had lots of time to visit museums, which weren't crowded, and other sights. The crowds watching the processions were very respectful and it was easy to get from place to place when I was sightseeing or just generally walking around. I'm not Christian and not particularly religious but I found the processions to be very moving. I noted that there seemed to be more crowds on successive days, but I couldn't say if that continued after mid-week. From there I went to Sevilla where the mood was much more festive than religious and the crowds (many were Spaniards presumably from other parts of the country) seemed to treat processions more as spectacle than rite. Don't miss the oldest wine bar of - well, I don't remember of what area but definitely more than just Malaga. It was super crowded at lunchtime, better to wait till midafternoon for serious tasting.

Posted by
1932 posts

I was in Malaga during the Santa Semana a couple of years ago. We were staying on the Costa del Sol but visited during the day a couple of times. The processions are in the evening so during the day there is some set up going on but not in a way that interferes with moving around the city. There are lot of large groups eating lunch and socialising before the events begin so getting lunch was tricky but we managed. We didn’t stay late enough to actually see any of the procession. It’s broadcast on local TV so we had a look at it that way.

Posted by
2884 posts

Wow! These are the types of responses I was hoping for!!! Thank you!

Okay - I’m going to leave Malaga on the itinerary. My research indicates that most of the museums/sites are open for Holy Week so I should be set.

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