The popular feast of the Virgen del Carmen in Málaga takes place on July 16th in honour of this local patron saint of fishermen and sailors - particularly in the more traditional fishing neighbourhoods of the city, such as El Palo, Huelin, and Pedregalejo. The festival, which is one of the oldest in Málaga, starts with a procession of the Virgen through the streets, before she is transferred to a jábega, a typical boat of Málaga, for a trip round the bay.

The Virgen del Carmen or Our Lady of Mount Carmel is the common name given to Saint Mary of Mount Carmel, a name which derives from her veneration on Mount Carmel near Haifa in the Holy Land. And the word ‘Carmel’ or ‘Carmen’ derives from the Hebrew word ‘Al-Karem’, meaning 'the garden of God'.

It was at a cave on Mount Carmel that the prophet Elijah successfully challenged the prophets of Baal to see whose God was the strongest. Many centuries later, hermits following in Elijah's footsteps asked for the protection of the Virgin Mary at Mount Carmel, and she began to be adopted by mariners and fishermen as their patron.

Here in Andalucia, on the evening of July 16th, in fishing villages and towns up and down the coast, as the Virgin is paraded through the streets and taken round the bay, bands play, crowds cheer, rockets are set off and fireworks fill the sky.

An unusual example of devotion to the Virgin takes place in the vicinity of Capitanía on the coast of Benalmádena, and has this year been declared a festival of particular touristic importance by the Diputación de Málaga. Called La Chiquita because of her diminutive stature, this small Virgen del Carmen effigy lives practically all year round at a depth of nine metres in a cave in Laja Bermeja, on the seabed in Benalmádena marina. Here she is kept inside a diving bottle, which serves as an urn and is vacuum-sealed with 20mm-thick glass. This means that, despite the fact that she has been on the seabed for years, the effigy itself is undamaged.

Every year, on the Sunday before the celebration of the Virgen del Carmen, divers enter the cave, take out La Chiquita and transfer her to land. She only spends a few days on land, and then on July 16th, she returns to her cave on the seabed.