Hotel chain Travelodge is currently offering very special autumn promotional prices which well-organised travellers can take advantage of if they plan to take a mini-break or weekend in Spain this coming autumn. The hotel chain has thousands of rooms available from €10 per night for stays between 01 September and 31 December this year across many of its more than 470 hotels in Spain and the UK.

Travelodge’s expansion into Spain in well under way and work on the new Travelodge hotel in Valencia, the Travelodge Valencia Aeropuerto, is reported to be at a very advanced stage and the budget hotel chain expects to open the hotel later this month. The new Travelodge hotel in Valencia will have 116 rooms and, as the name suggests, is located very near the Airport of Manises and, in fact, is only 2 minutes away by underground. The hotel is also connected to Valencia city centre by two different metro lines so guests should not have to wait around long should they want to get into the city centre.

In Barcelona, the group has also begun construction of its second hotel in the Catalan capital. When completed the Travelodge Barcelona Rambla Poble Nou will have 250 rooms, 98 parking spaces and a cafe-bar that can hold up to…Click to read more about Spain Hotel News

British newspaper ‘The Times‘ recently recognised the Parador in Santiago de Compostela as one of the top five hotels in Spain when it comes to the quality of cuisine available. The newspaper included an article that highlighted the history, location and quality interiors of the Hostal dos Reis Catolicos which is located right in the heart of the Galician capital in the northwest of Spain.

The Times gave particular praise to this Galician hotel in a report about the most desirable destinations in Spain for the lovers of fine cuisine. In addition to highlighting the Hostal dos Reis Catolicos, the newspaper included four other establishments in Spain in the article which it felt merited inclusion because of the quality of their cuisine and which had other interesting aspects of note.

In the case of the Hostal dos Reis Catolicos, The Times highlighted its great historical heritage and prime location next to the cathedral of Santiago de Compostela in the very centre of the capital of Galicia. Both buildings form a right angle on the famous Plaza do Obradoiro and the hotel can rightly claim the title of being the oldest hotel in the world as it was founded in 1499. The hotel was set up in the Middle Ages to provide shelter and give assistance to…Click to read more about Spain Hotel News

The hotel group Domus Hotels, which is based in the city of Oviedo in the north of Spain, has taken over the management of the Hotel Almirante, which is located in the traditional and popular seafront of the Playa de San Juan in Alicante. The hotel is on Avenida de Niza and it is the only hotel in the area which can provide direct access to the ever popular beach.

The agreement with the current owners was reached by using a commercial franchise contract and involves the maintenance and running of both the hotel, its cafeteria and restaurant, meeting rooms and banqueting facilities. This latest addition is aimed at enhancing the position and reputation of Domus hotels within the tourism sector in Spain and means that the group now has a total of 18 hotel establishments spread throughout the country. The chain is on track with its strategic expansion plan and indeed intends to add even more hotels before the end of this year. Domus hotels say they are actively seeking and negotiating new expansion projects throughout Spain in cities such as Valladolid, Burgos, Vitoria, Barcelona, Madrid, Santiago de Compostela and La Coruña.

The Hotel Almirante in Alicante is a three star establishment aimed primarily at summer tourists who are seeking a…Click to read more about Spain Hotel News

According to a recent report released by the Spanish version of the famous international hotel booking engine Hotels.com, the hotels in Spain continue to have a very strong presence among the searches performed by visitors to the site from many varied countries like Norway, Sweden, Finland, Germany, the Netherlands, Russia, UK, Ireland, France, Portugal and Switzerland.

The hotels on the island of Ibiza occupy the first position in popularity among Swedish users of Hotels.com and in fact there has been an increase of some 543 percent in searches for hotels on the island when compared with the same period last year. It looks like many Swedes intend to have a summer full of sun, sea and clubbing. Ibiza came in in fourth position among Internet searchers in the UK and Portugal which represents an increase of 370 and 384 percent respectively over last year. Hotels on the island were also in particular demand from searchers in Norway, Germany and Ireland.

The hotels in Barcelona were particularly popular among on-line hotel searchers in Norway, Russia, Portugal and Switzerland. The most striking case is that of Russia where the hotels in Barcelona experienced an incredible 546 percent increase in the number of queries from that country over 2010.

The hotels in the ever popular Balearic and…Click to read more about Spain Hotel News

When we consider that a hotel in San Sebastian in the cool north of Spain is likely to cost three times more than an equivalent hotel in the same category in Murcia in the sunny southeast, it is definitely worth taking our time when it comes to choosing our vacation destination in Spain. In addition, when it is probable that many hotels in Spain are likely to raise prices by anywhere up to 58 percent in July, we should also give careful consideration to the timing of our stay.

On-line travel portal Trivago, which specializes in hotel price comparison, recently published a report with the average price of accommodation across many cities in Spain for July and the results are definitely worth bearing in mind when it comes to booking a hotel in Spain.

This year Salou and Gandia are the holiday destinations whose hotels have registered the highest price increases in July, up 58 percent and 52 percent respectively. A night in a hotel in Salou in July will set you back on average €158, whilst a stay in a hotel in Gandia in the province of Valencia will be around €125.

Slightly less expensive than Salou is Almuñécar, where hotels have raised their rates by around 43 percent in July and a…Click to read more about Spain Hotel News

The hotel sector in Santiago de Compostela, the capital of the autonomous region of Galicia in the northwest of Spain, has been having a tough time this year. The quality of the hotels in the area is considered by many to be among the best in Spain and the city is famous as the ending point of the famous Way of Saint James or Camino de Santiago, which each year attracts thousands of pilgrims from all over the world. Last year was a special Jubilee Year or Año Xacobeo, which only occurs at five, six or eleven year intervals when the birthday of St James the Apostle, July 25th, falls on a Sunday. Because of this last year proved to be a bumper year for the hotels in this part of Spain as many thousands of extra pilgrims and visitors flocked to the city for the special celebrations. The same hotels are now suffering a bit of a hangover as the harsh reality of trying to fill rooms in a normal year in the current economic environment settles in.

Last year the hotels in Santiago showed the highest increase in profitability among hotels in any urban destination in Spain. They experienced an increase of 30 percent in profitability during the first…Click to read more about Spain Hotel News

Spanish online hotel site Trivago.es recently published a ranking of the ten most popular beach hotels in Spain for the summer of 2011. The list was based both on the feedback of Trivago users in Spain as well as the number of visits to each of the individual hotels from the web site.

Many of these hotels in Spain are large, resort-type establishments that provide a multitude of services and activities whilst others are small boutique hotels that pay very close attention to every detail and offer very personalized customer service.

The Hotel Duque de Najera is located on the seafront close to the fishing port of Rota in Cadiz. It is a four star hotel with spectacular views of the bay of Cadiz from both its panoramic solarium as well as from the terrace of the El Embarcadero restaurant. The restaurant specialises in seafood dishes prepared with local products. It is near the historic centre of Rota and just a few kilometres from Cadiz.

The Torres de Somo in Cantabria combines both vintage and modern touches in this charming hotel. The scenery surrounding the hotel is perfect to help guests relax and unwind. A small pine forest leads down to a 4 km long beach and the hotel also has stunning views over the bay…Click to read more about Spain Hotel News

Who among us has never wondered what it would be like to step into the shoes of a celebrity for a few days? Festivals, premieres, parties, designer clothes for stepping out on the red carpet and enjoying the “dolce far niente” without another care in the world.  Film stars, musicians, sportsmen and even politicians love to travel all over the world and Spain is one of their favourite destinations either for spending their main vacations or just for a short break.

Celebrity guests choose many different types of hotels for their stays and majestic historic hotels, small palaces or even grand Paradores are among their favourite hotels in Spain.

Among the hotels in Madrid popular with celebrities are the Hotel AC Santo Mauro and the Ritz Hotel. The former is a small nineteenth-century palace in the centre of Madrid often chosen by David and Victoria Beckham during their visits to the capital of Spain. The Ritz hotel has a long history of countless visits from famous people including Ernest Hemingway and Princess Grace and Prince Rainier of Monaco who celebrated their honeymoon in a suite in this landmark Madrid hotel. Famous showbiz guests from the worlds of music and movies included the likes of Ava Gardner, Michelle Pfeiffer, Madonna and Richard Gere.

The W Hotel in Barcelona…Click to read more about Spain Hotel News

NH Hotels recently confirmed that the recovery in business which the group experienced in 2010 has continued into the first five months of this year. According to the president of NH Hotels in Spain, Mariano Perez Claver, the group will close 2011 with 405 hotels in its portfolio.

To achieve this target the chain still has to open six hotels in the current year which will add 740 new rooms to the group’s offering. Three of these hotels are in Spain, the NH Diagonal Center in Barcelona with 138 rooms, the NH Palacio Mejía Lequerica in Madrid with 81 rooms and the NH Laguna Spain in Tenerife with 123 rooms. The other hotel openings will take place in Bogota and Frankfurt.

During the first five months of 2011 six other hotels in Spain have already joined NH group. In the period the EBITDA of the company has reached €73.3 million, an increase of 46 percent over the same period last year. The RevPAR increased by 8.4 percent, occupancy rates rose by 4.7 percent and overall prices increased by 3.5 percent. If this trend continues the company expects to achieve an 8 percent increase in the RevPAR by the end of 2011.

The company has also set out a plan that will carry through…Click to read more about Spain Hotel News

The amount of money invested into the acquisition of hotels in Spain during the first six months of the year has already reached some €400 million, according to a report into the hotel industry in Spain prepared by financial consultants Irea. Irea is based in Madrid and specialises in the property and hotel sectors in Spain.

The figure for the first half of 2011 is already higher than three quarters of the total investment in hotel acquisitions conducted in Spain throughout 2010. There have been 15 transactions so far this year whereas during all of last year there were a total of 17 transactions in which 20 hotels were sold amounting to a total value of €515 million.

“The data suggest we are currently experiencing an improvement in the hotel investment market,” a spokesperson from Irea stated, even though overall in 2010 investments in hotels in Spain experienced a decline of 35% over the previous year. The study shows that hotel assets in Spain remain attractive to foreign investors who now once more seem to have cash to invest in the sector and emphasizes that five-star hotels are the most in demand representing about 50 percent of the investments made so far this year.

Some of the hotels that have changed hands in the…Click to read more about Spain Hotel News