Malaga: El Torcal Hiking Tour

El Torcal is a natural park just one hour outside of Malaga. However, the landscape is a world away. This is a great day trip from Malaga for those who want to get to know the region of Malaga from a different perspective and who want to get away from the city for a day. El Torcal is so close and yet it’s unique landscape and terrain have made it a Unesco World Heritage Site.

El Torcal is a natural paradise characterized by impressive limestone rock formations, the most important in Europe. The actual rock formations are a result of a process that began 200 million years ago, when a large part of Europe and the Middle East were under water. It was at that moment that the process of sedimentation, originating with the accumulation of skeletons and shells of sea animals, started. The process would take 175 million years. These sediments accumulated and compacted and compressed into layers, forming compact strips of earth thousands of meters long. As a consequence of tectonic plate movements, the sediments began to emerge and the rock began to suffer the effects of erosion of water, ice and wind, leaving the spectacular landscape that today greets visitors at El Torcal.

The hiking Tour that we propose for El Torcal of Malaga takes you into the heart of this singularly beautiful park. We will show you some of the fossilized remains of these sediments that are evidence of the process that created the structures, and you will have the chance to observe the fauna of the park as well: the golden eagle, the peregrine falcon and Bonelli’s Eagle, as well as numerous reptiles and the everpresent wild goat.

This is an easy grade tour. It is suitable for all ages.

We recommend you combine the hiking tour of El Torcal in Malaga with a visit to Antequera, where you can visit the monumental sites of the old town.