The best long weekend getaways to Spain's small cities

With a long weekend on the horizon, the urge to go somewhere different is hard to ignore. Skip the obvious and consider what Spaniards themselves search for when they want to get away, the results might surprise you.

The holiday rental portal Holidu analysed monthly Google searches for Spanish villages with fewer than 5,000 residents. Four of the top five are in the green, Atlantic north: a part of Spain most British travellers have never thought to visit, and probably should.

Five small cities for a long weekend getaway

All five are long-weekend sized. None of them require a packed itinerary. They will make you wonder why you didn’t go sooner.

1. Comillas, Cantabria | 4660 monthly searches The most-searched village in Spain isn’t in Andalusia, it’s a small Cantabrian town where Gaudí once built a summer house. Ceramic-tiled fantasy architecture, green meadows, a wide sandy beach. Utterly unexpected, completely worth a few days. Santander is an hour away, with direct flights from London and Edinburgh.
2. Santillana del Mar, Cantabria | 3490 monthly searches One of Europe’s best-preserved medieval towns, just down the road from Comillas, making the two an easy, unhurried pairing for a long weekend. Cobbled streets, stone manor houses, and nearby Altamira, where 14,000-year-old cave paintings once stopped Picasso in his tracks. Sartre called it the most beautiful village in Spain.
3. Albarracín, Teruel | 3290 monthly searches A rust-red medieval town carved into a river gorge in inland Aragon. Two hours from Valencia, three from Madrid or Barcelona, very doable as a long weekend base. Not the easiest to reach without a car, which is exactly why it still feels like a secret worth keeping.
4.  San Vicente de la Barquera, Cantabria  | 3220 monthly searches A working fishing town between a wide estuary and the open sea, with a medieval castle above and the Picos de Europa visible behind on clear days. Pair it with Comillas or Santillana for a Cantabrian long weekend that covers beaches, mountains, medieval history, and some of the best seafood you’ll eat all year
5. Frigiliana, Málaga | 3380 monthly searches If you prefer the south, this is a great option. Whitewashed alleys, cascading geraniums, views down to the Mediterranean, the Andalusia of the imagination, without the crowds. Ten minutes inland from Nerja, an hour east of Málaga airport. Small enough to explore on foot, and great to linger over long lunches all weekend.

Methodology

The rankings are based on analysis by Holidu, the vacation rental search engine, which tracked average monthly Google searches over a 12-month period for Spanish villages with 5,000 or fewer residents. Search volumes were measured using the terms “what to do in” and “what to see in” combined with each village name, a reliable proxy for genuine travel interest rather than, say, news coverage or passing curiosity. Only settlements meeting the Spanish National Statistics Institute’s definition of a small municipality were included. Where two villages tied on search volume, the smaller settlement by population was ranked higher. Data was collected in April 2026.