Hasta luego to My Malaga At Home
They say time flies, but although it’s less than 3 months ago, 23 March seems like a lifetime away. That was the date of the first post in a brand-new section on Guide to Malaga: My Malaga At Home. If someone had said to us in January (or even February) that we’d be creating Malaga virtually for our 25,000 users a month, we’d never have believed them.
But create we did and My Malaga At Home showcased this wonderful city as best we could in lockdown. Our aim was to keep Malaga alive and remind you of the city when you couldn’t visit and hopefully inspire you to come and stay once you could travel safely again.
It’s now 19 June and after over 3 months of lockdown and easing out of it, Spain moves into a new phase. On Sunday, she opens her borders to travellers from Schengen and on 1 July to other countries. Always, of course, subject to reciprocal agreements and quarantine restrictions in other countries.
So, we feel it’s time to say hasta luego to My Malaga At Home. We were going to call this piece Goodbye but hasta luego felt less permanent and definitely friendlier. Hopefully we won’t be adding any more content to this section, but judging by covid-19’s unpredictable behaviour, who knows?
Looking back on My Malaga At Home
When you’re stuck at home (and we couldn’t even go out for exercise in Malaga), creating interesting and varied content is a challenge. Add to this, the complete absence of anything going on in Malaga and it began to look like an impossible thing to do.
But we put together a creative bunch of people and added some technology and the section started to come together. (We also winged it a bit, but hey, so did everyone!) Here’s what we got up to:
The videos
This is our favourite section and thanks to this, our YouTube channel actually got some followers! And Joanna even did 2 live videos. Our My Malaga At Home videos showed:
Sandra from SandraTeach (our favourite Spanish teacher) who taught us about ordering coffee and breakfast in Malaga.
Julian at Los Patios de Beatas (one of our favourite wine bars) talked us through a Malaga wine tasting session.
Jessica from Your Planner created an amazing Malaga cheeseboard and Lynsey from La Rosilla showed us her house and made a couple of tapas.
More energetically, Ben from The Living Room showed us a gruelling workout and the lovely Eva from IShowUSevilla taught us how to clap flamenco. After all the excitement, a bit of Malaga meditation from Laura at Zen Studio was more than welcome.
Thank you to you all.
The music
We also created a Malaga playlist, 11 tracks that reminded us of the city, being by the sea and generally enjoying life. Have a listen.
The thinking caps
We also asked for input from you. Our Malaga quiz was very popular, but I made the questions too difficult and only 10 entries got all the answers right. Mind you, there were only 10 prizes so that worked out perfectly!
We asked you to describe Malaga in 3 words and you were certainly creative. And we asked for your thoughts on the future for tourism in Malaga. This got an amazing response and has been very useful to us moving forward. Thank you.
At Guide to Malaga, we also got creating and came up with 2 new ebooks during lockdown. We’re particularly proud of Malaga Fine Wining & Dining, which has had some excellent reviews. And we love Your Essential Malaga Phrasebook because it’s a fun and refreshing look at learning Spanish. You can browse them in our new eBookshop.
The results?
While our website wasn’t nearly as busy in April and May as usual, the My Malaga At Home section proved very popular. It had thousands of visits and you spent at least 3.5 minutes on each page.
And most satisfying of all was your feedback. We received a ton of grateful emails thanking us for keeping the Malaga flame alive during lockdown. Thank you for letting us know.
What’s next?
Malaga welcomes overseas visitors back as from Sunday, which will seem like a breath of fresh air after over 3 months. We’re very conscious that this isn’t over yet. Far from it and there’ll be bumps along the way for sure.
But reassured that Malaga has pulled out all the stops to ensure your visit is as safe as possible – read about the new normality in Malaga. There are hardly any events, but Malaga looks lovely, all the monuments and museums are open as are the beaches and lots of our favourite restaurants are ready and waiting.
Guide to Malaga will meanwhile continue to offer the best information in English about Malaga. Our newsletter will keep subscribers up to date as usual. So, no changes there. And we look forward to welcoming you back as soon as you’re ready and can travel. Malaga is still here and waiting. See you soon!
Start planning your trip now with our best-selling ebook, Malaga on a Short Break. All you need to get the most out of a 2, 3 or 5-day visit to the city and for just €4.95!
A special thanks to everyone who helped with My Malaga At Home. In particular, my business coach Sarah Powell for her encouragement and seemingly unlimited ideas; Luis ColomĂ©, our tech guy and webmaster for adding new elements to the website at short notice; and Jose MarĂa Sánchez for his support and for being there during lockdown. I couldn’t have hoped for a better companion.
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