I was recently in Malaga after several years and was pleasently surprised how it had changed since. The Port area, the arrival of crusie ships, AVE, metro, Picasso museum etc, closer to Granada, Seville, Cordoba ( my personal favourite cities in Spain )
The old part is being cleaned up, the tunnel opened & there was a massive buzz despite of the crises. What do the forum users think ???
An apartment in Marbella, Estepona, Sotogrande for the ” la weekend !!!! along with one in Malaga capital could be a nice mixture???
Any comments, Katy, Angie, Ardun, I am relying on you to have your direct & constructive views.
I can’t comment about Malaga but in our little town the town hall have had various people out repairing things, gardening, painting etc. About time too I say as in the boom they built so many new blocks on the outskirts of town and the old historical part crumbled a bit. I guess it is something positive to do and gives the unemployed locals who have friends and family in the town hall some cash?
True, maybe for some a nice cheap little holiday apartment would be a great way to enjoy holidays in the sun. Investment might not be a word I would now use about Spain though….
shakeel, good post. I have always liked Malaga and personally prefer it to Marbella. In my opinion it has a far more Spanish feel to it, really good shops, great Tapas bars, far less bling etc in fact we even considered buying an apartment there as it was also so close to the airport. The new bypass road is great, can avoid the City with ease too in order to travel East/North and lakes etc. 8)
More and more townhalls are seeing the benefit of improving their ‘product’ to attract new and returning tourists. There has also been a steady and increasing trend to move away from the ‘mass tourism’ that only want sun,sand,sea to those looking at a variety of leisure activities.
You asked for our direct and constructive comments about Malaga and I’ve given you an honest answer, so no I’m not sitting on the fence as you say, I actually like Malaga and a lot more towns, villages and areas in Spain, but to be honest I prefer the Costa Brava area to the Southern Costas 8) El Pimpi in Malaga great for atmosphere 🙂 Marbella and Banus? a bit tacky methinks 😆
What I don’t like are all the bad aspects that get mentioned here so much, when Spain addresses these it will be better for it apart from current Eurozone turmoils 🙄
Hi Angie,
Apology, my mind was on a different tangent. So it does not surprise me that you were lost.
Malaga to me should have been like Barcelona. The city authorities lacked vision in the past & now perhaps for the cutting edge projects the money is not there. A city with beaches, International airport, birth place of Picasso, the only city which has Roman & Moorish heritage within less than a few meters, good food etc, etc. Malaga should have been high up there with the list of cities to see before once leaves this planet !!!!!
Now, I like Malaga as I’ve stated before but have any of you seen BBC News report from Malaga today with reporter Jon Sopel.
He had the Manager of Malaga Tourist Board on, Javier Fernandez,and asked him two questions involving how the Spanish problems were impacting on the City and the Coast. He would not answer these directly but spouted off all the attractions Malaga had to offer, to which Jon Sopel thanked him but said he was a very good salesman and expected him to say things like that as if to say ‘why did I bother asking this jerk’?
How he reminded me of some of the worst salesmen on the Coast but Spanish this time, I wouldn’t trust him further than I could throw him, obnoxious git, but pretending all was well in the Costa del Sol. So with people even like him in a position of standing in Spain acting in denial, no wonder they are in deep poo and not to be trusted.
@angie. I saw the tail end of it, when they were talking to the middle age couple. To be fair to him what else did you expect him to say.
I have noticed when BBC interview’s non Brits Politicians, people in authority etc they do not follow up or persist that people gave them an answer anything relating to the question that was raised. ( Jeremy Paxman excluded)
I must admit that on my last visit the city was full of people and Bars, parking etc were full. Ofcourse one cannot judge a book by its cover and the Spanish mentality to live for the day.
I wonder if there are any crime statistics to hand ????
Crime is quite bad in Málaga, some places are virtually no-go areas. Like most large Cities it has it’s share of shootings and knife crime.
There is a report this morning of someone being murdered a couple of days ago. Here is a clip from Diariosur today. It has another face behind the tourist veneer.
The threat now is an escalation of violence that has been staged in recent weeks with a crime, several shootings and numerous stabbings
That’s an interesting article katy, I clicked the translate tab at top of page and read the English version, that’s the end of my tapas crawls there 🙄
Goes to show that what tourists see is not the whole picture, a bit like Barcelona and other big Cities, I suppose being a port, lots of drugs pass through there.