The City Council of Alcalá de Henares has taken a key step to elevate the Cervantes Week to the category of Festival of International Tourist Interest. The proposal approved in the municipal Plenary Session formally requests that the regional government of the Community of Madrid initiate the procedures with the Secretary of State for Tourism to achieve this distinction.
Isabel Ruiz Maldonado, deputy mayor and councilor for Tourism, highlighted that this initiative comes 24 years after its declaration as a Festival of Regional Tourist Interest and 8 years after obtaining the National Tourist Interest status. She noted that Cervantes Week is one of the city's major events, with strong social, citizen, commercial, tourist, and institutional support, considering it a model for large-scale events.
The Cervantes Week, celebrated every October around October 9th, the anniversary of Miguel de Cervantes' baptism, is the main cultural and tourist event in Alcalá de Henares. Its program includes activities such as the Cervantes Market, the Popular Reading of Don Quixote, the Civic Procession, the Old and Second-hand Book Fair, and the Ciudad de Alcalá and Cervantes Chico Awards, among others.
This event annually attracts hundreds of thousands of visitors, with figures exceeding 300,000 visits in recent years. It provides a significant boost to the local economy, commerce, and hospitality sector, while also reinforcing the image of Alcalá de Henares as a World Heritage City and an international benchmark for the legacy of Cervantes.
Ruiz Maldonado stated that it is the city's "most original and genuine" event, highlighting the universal banner of Miguel de Cervantes and the importance of the Birthplace Museum, the most visited among those managed by the regional government of the Community of Madrid.
The Councilor for Tourism emphasized the exceptional nature of Cervantes Week, describing it as the action with the greatest impact in terms of tourist numbers and hotel reservations, not only in Alcalá but across all the Cities of Human Heritage in Spain. "There is no cultural, tourist, or leisure event in Spain that brings together the values of Cervantes and embodies such a magnitude of cultural, leisure, tourist, and commercial model," she concluded.
