Where to stay for the eclipse? What to check before you book

The best option is to sleep inside the path of totality, and so close to where you’ll watch it that you don’t need to take the car that morning. Before booking, check five things: that the town has totality, how many seconds it lasts there, how far away your viewing spot is, whether you can cancel once the weather forecast is out, and what time you have to leave the room. And book early, because August fills the coast without any help from an eclipse: last August, hotels in Torremolinos had an average occupancy of 90.8% of their bed places, according to provisional figures from the INE, Spain’s National Statistics Institute.

1. That the town has totality

An advert that says “Costa de la Luz”, “a stone’s throw from Tarifa” or “Cádiz sierra” doesn’t tell you whether there will be totality there. What counts is the exact town where you’ll be sleeping, and its page tells you. Neighbouring towns have very different luck:

99.9% is a partial eclipse, with no corona and glasses from start to finish, however close it is to the path. Check the name of the town on will I see it?, which takes you to its page.

2. How many seconds you get there

Inside the path, where you are still makes a difference. Casarabonela has 10 s; Ceuta, 4 min 48 s. A gap like that can count for more than the price or the view. If you’re staying in Málaga, which has 1 min 49 s, the C-1 local train (Cercanías) runs to Torremolinos, Benalmádena and Fuengirola, which have more. The towns with the most totality are in the best villages to see it from.

3. How far it is from where you’ll watch

The Sun will be about 38° high and to the east, so a beach, a square or a roof terrace with a clear view to the east will do; there’s no need to climb to any viewpoint. If you can walk there from where you’re staying, so much the better. Totality falls on a Monday in August at mid-morning, and the traffic guide (in Spanish) explains why that morning is not one for moving the car. To find out whether a building will hide the Sun from you, see where to look during the eclipse.

4. That you can cancel after seeing the forecast

The first forecast from the European model (ECMWF) that reaches as far as 2 August comes out on the night of 27 July, and we publish it that same day on the eclipse weather page (in Spanish). A booking you can cancel or change until after that date lets you move if the forecast is bad. Morning cloud is the risk on the coast. For the Atlantic coast, Jay Anderson (Eclipsophile) recommends heading inland, so accommodation from which you can move inland has an advantage.

5. What time you have to leave the room

If you’re leaving on the Monday itself, ask what time you have to check out and whether they’ll keep your luggage. Around the Strait the partial phase ends at about 12:00 (in Tarifa, at 12:00:35), and with totality at mid-morning it can easily catch you packing. Staying on for the Monday night as well saves you travelling back at the same time as everyone else.

Hotel occupancy in August, according to the INE

The INE’s bed-place occupancy rate shows what share of hotel bed places was occupied, on average, each night of the month. In the tourist spots in the path, August already fills a large share of the beds without any eclipse: between 72 and 91% last August.

Campsites, campervans and wild camping

In Andalusia, Decree 26/2018 on tourist campsites states that “camping and overnight stays for holiday or leisure purposes outside tourist campsites are prohibited as a general rule” (Article 1.5). Outside the scope of that decree are motorhome parking areas, which are governed by municipal bylaws and, on the road, by Spain’s General Traffic Regulations, and one-off camps organised for people attending an event (Article 1.4). The same decree treats a motorhome that extends its space by unfolding elements as camping (Article 7.3). For the eclipse, the safe choice is a campsite or a motorhome area, not a patch of waste ground. The difference between parking and camping is in the campervan guide (in Spanish). The decree is Andalusian: Ceuta and Melilla have their own rules.

Sleeping outside the path and getting in early

Seville (98.4%), Granada (99.2%) and Almería (99.9%) are left out. But from Seville, the train to Cádiz stops at Jerez, El Puerto de Santa María, Puerto Real and San Fernando, all inside the path. If you’re staying outside it, set off the day before or very early; the plan, city by city, is in the guide to Seville and Andalusia (in Spanish). If you’re coming from Portugal, the sums are in the eclipse from Portugal.

Sources: totality verdict and durations: IGN — eclipses.ign.es (in Spanish); percentages for the towns without totality, the Sun’s altitude and the end of the partial phase: eclipseando’s engine (skyfield + DE440s); hotel occupancy: Establecimientos, plazas estimadas, grados de ocupación y personal empleado por puntos turísticos — INE, Encuesta de Ocupación Hotelera (in Spanish: bed-place occupancy rate in August; the latest, provisional); Decreto 26/2018, de 23 de enero, de ordenación de los campamentos de turismo — BOJA n.º 27 (in Spanish: Articles 1.4, 1.5 and 7.3); first ECMWF forecast reaching eclipse day: eclipseando’s check on ECMWF open data; Total Solar Eclipse 2027 — Eclipsophile (Atlantic coast: head inland); Línea Sevilla-Cádiz — Wikipedia and Línea C-1 (Cercanías Málaga) — Wikipedia (in Spanish: stops).