The dates that fill (and empty) Santa Marta between October 2026 and August 2027, and what to do with each one if you run a short-term rental.
In Santa Marta demand does not rise by month, it rises by date. One well-priced holiday weekend can earn more than a full week of shoulder season, and a Tayrona National Park closure can open gaps in your calendar nobody saw coming. Here is the map of what is coming up to August 2027 and how to prepare, whether you run a rental apartment or you are planning a trip.
How full does Santa Marta get in high season?
Very. Over the 2024-2025 Christmas and Reyes season, average hotel occupancy was 89%, peaking at 95% over the Reyes holiday weekend, according to the hotel associations Asotelca and Cotelco Magdalena. For December 2025 and January 2026, Cotelco projected more than 1.1 million visitors over 60 days, counting people staying in apartments, cabins and family homes, and named 26 December to the Reyes weekend as the busiest stretch of the year.
Mind the other side: most of that tourism is domestic and arrives by road. That means last-minute bookings, short stays on holiday weekends, and guests who are very price-sensitive outside the peaks.
Calendar: October to December 2026
- 19 October to 2 November: Tayrona National Park closure. The last of three scheduled closures in 2026 (the others were in February and June). It reopens on 3 November. The park uses the time for beach recovery work, and the Indigenous communities of the Sierra Nevada carry out traditional practices.
- Saturday 31 October to Monday 2 November: All Saints' holiday weekend. It lines up with Halloween and with the last days of the Tayrona closure. Expect domestic demand, but not from visitors coming only for the park.
- Saturday 14 to Monday 16 November: Cartagena Independence holiday weekend. A national holiday that many travellers from inland cities use for a trip to the coast.
- Monday 7 and Tuesday 8 December: Velitas and the Immaculate Conception. The 8th is a Tuesday, so many people take the Monday off for a four-day weekend. The night of the 7th is the candle night (Noche de Velitas).
- From 15 December: high season. School holidays begin and demand climbs every week until New Year. Christmas (25th) and New Year's Day (1 January) both fall on a Friday.
Calendar: January to August 2027
- Saturday 9 to Monday 11 January: Reyes holiday weekend. Historically the occupancy peak of the year and the end of the holiday season.
- Saturday 6 to Tuesday 9 February: Barranquilla Carnival. Barranquilla is about two hours away by bus and fills up; Santa Marta works as a base for a day at the parades and back to the beach.
- Likely Tayrona closure in February. In 2025 and 2026 the park closed from 1 to 15 February. Parques Nacionales had not published 2027 dates when we wrote this, so treat it as likely, not confirmed.
- Saturday 20 to Monday 22 March: San José holiday weekend.
- Sunday 21 to Sunday 28 March: Holy Week (Semana Santa). Thursday 25 and Friday 26 are public holidays. It is the second-strongest season of the year on the coast.
- May and June holiday weekends: 8 to 10 May (Ascension), 29 to 31 May (Corpus Christi) and 5 to 7 June (Sacred Heart). 1 May falls on a Saturday, so there is no long weekend. If the pattern holds, Tayrona would close from 1 to 15 June, on top of two of those weekends.
- July: mid-year school holidays and Fiesta del Mar. There are long weekends on 3 to 5 July (Saints Peter and Paul) and 10 to 12 July (a new holiday for the Virgin of Chiquinquirá, created by Law 2578 of 2026 and challenged before the Constitutional Court, so confirm it). 20 July falls on a Tuesday. Fiesta del Mar celebrates the city's founding anniversary on 29 July; in 2026 it ran from 23 to 29 July, and the 2027 programme is not out yet.
- Saturday 14 to Monday 16 August: Assumption holiday weekend. 7 August falls on a Saturday and creates no long weekend.
How should you price a holiday weekend?
Price each long weekend as an event of its own, not as "just another weekend". If you use a dynamic pricing tool, check that it has Colombian public holidays loaded, and raise Friday and Saturday by hand, since that is when people arrive. Sunday is usually the hardest night to sell, because many guests drive home early on Monday.
Set a three-night minimum on long weekends (Friday to Monday) and do not accept one-night Saturday bookings: it is your most valuable night and it leaves orphan nights on either side. If Friday or Sunday is still open a week out, that is the moment to allow two-night stays.
How should you handle December and January?
- Open your calendar early. Families plan year-end trips in October and November. If December is not open yet, or still carries last year's prices, you are already losing bookings.
- Long minimum stays at the very top. Between 26 December and the Reyes weekend, five to seven nights makes sense. Before 20 December, drop to three or four to fill the first half of the month.
- Sell New Year as a package. Almost nobody books 31 December alone; build a block from 29 or 30 December to 2 January.
- Use a firmer cancellation policy. On peak dates, a late cancellation is a night you will not sell again.
- Reduce or remove weekly and monthly discounts for those weeks. They are meant for low season.
What to do when Tayrona closes
A closure does not empty the city, but it takes away one reason to visit for foreign travellers and anyone coming for the park. Do not assume normal holiday-weekend pricing applies: the 2026 All Saints' weekend falls inside the closure, and if the pattern holds, the same will happen to the June 2027 long weekends.
Use your listing description and pre-arrival messages to show what stays open: Minca and the Sierra Nevada, the historic centre, El Rodadero, Taganga and the beaches outside the park. A guest who arrives informed leaves better reviews than one who finds out at the park gate.
Operations count too
In high season the hard part is rarely finding guests; it is looking after them well. Some El Rodadero hotels say they have to triple their water-truck deliveries in those weeks. Check your apartment's tank and pump, service the air conditioning in November, and book cleaners in advance for the busiest turnover days, especially 2 January and the Reyes Monday.
If you are coming as a traveller
All of this helps you too: for lower prices and fewer people, avoid the long weekends and the stretch from 26 December to 11 January, and check Tayrona closures before you book flights. Tuesday to Thursday outside the peaks is a different Santa Marta.
77Rentals has apartments in Santa Marta and manages properties for other owners with this same calendar in mind. If you want to book for any of these dates, or you own an apartment and want us to run it, get in touch.
