Holy Week has closed with record figures that exceed pre-pandemic levels, both in hotel occupancy and prices, with full houses on the islands, coastal areas and in the capitals most linked to processions. All this, while waiting for this Monday, which is a holiday in several autonomous communities.
The high temperatures, inappropriate for this time of year, have helped to fill the beaches, hotels, restaurants and even the ski resorts, most of which say goodbye to the season in this way. In six communities -Balearic Islands, Catalonia, the Valencian Community, Navarra, the Basque Country and La Rioja- these first holidays of the year end this Easter Monday, but in the absence of closing their data, the forecasts of hoteliers and travel agents have been comfortably met.
Average hotel occupancies have been above 80%, once last-minute reservations have completed the already high occupancy rates, and have reached 100% in places such as the Canary Islands, the peninsular coasts and linked destinations to religious tourism, with Seville, Malaga, Toledo, Zamora or Valladolid, among others.
The president of the Spanish Confederation of Hotels and Tourist Accommodations (Cehat), Jorge Marichal, has told Efe that occupancies on the first days of the week are between 65 and 70%, to rise to an average of 95%. on the central dates (between Holy Thursday and Easter Sunday). The snow destinations have also been located on those central days in occupations close to 90%, according to Efe.
Total recovery compared to pre-Covid times
The executive vice president of the Spanish Confederation of Travel Agencies (CEAV), José Manuel Lastra, explained in statements to Efe that the figures for Holy Week reflect a full recovery of activity compared to pre-covid, both in incoming tourism and in issuer, and it has also done so in terms of employment, already clearly above then.
Spaniards have traveled both to national destinations (islands, coasts, and procession cities) and international destinations (European capitals, Egypt, Turkey, the Caribbean, and the United States), among which Asian countries are also recovering, according to CEAV.
The employers’ association of travel agencies also points out that in tourism from other countries the entry of British, German and French -the first three issuers of tourists to Spain- continues to be strong, and an intense recovery is also detected in the uimarkets, Latin America and For its part, Confebus, the road passenger transport employer, estimates that between Friday, March 31, and Monday, April 10, 5.7 million seats have been offered, with coastal cities and ski resorts in first place. positions.
Renfe increased the available capacity by more than 40,100 seats on its AVE, Avlo, Alvia, Euromed and Intercity commercial service trains to the most popular destinations such as Andalusia, Catalonia and the Valencian Community, thus offering close to two million seats.
Aena, for its part, calculates that Spanish airports were close to pre-covid levels, with 60,498 scheduled arrival and departure flights in this period, 1.5% more than last year and 4.6% below the 2019 programming, which was a historical record.
Prices increase by 19% compared to 2019
In the absence of confirmation by the National Institute of Statistics (INE) at the end of May, hotel prices will continue the rise they have been registering for 21 months, as most chains agree. Price indicators are positive for hoteliers, with increases of 19 percentage points in average room rate (ADR) over 2019 and 21 points in the case of the available room rate (RevPAR), according to Cehat.
Hotel price rises are responding to strong demand, says Cehat, urging customers to book early and get discounts. They admit that after the pandemic there was a “certain price stress” that “it does not seem foreseeable that they will go down.”
Revilla catalogs the occupation of his community as madness
The president of Cantabria, Miguel Ángel Revilla, has described this Monday as “madness” the occupation in the community during Holy Week. For his part, the Minister of Tourism, Culture and Sports, Arturo Bernal, has activated 88% occupation in the region on the main days of the celebrations, which reached 100% in capitals such as Granada, Córdoba, Seville and Málaga.
