Canary Islanders tell Brits to go home.

Just a suggestion. If you want to be the only tourist in town, try Sakarya in Turkey. I will be there next week.

PinkCosmos

I live in a tourist destination with a large lovely beach.

One of the main gripes is that tourists come in for the day, bring a picnic and sit on the beach. They don't go into the town and spend money in a cafe. They don't stay overnight. When they leave, they leave all of their rubbish behind. Therefore, the local council have to put in bigger bins and need staff to empty them two or three times a day in the season.

Visitors have also left disposable barbeques buried in the sand and put them in the bin which has then set on fire.

I agree about the ABnB's. People with this type of accommodation need to be registered in some way so that they met the same standards that hotels and guest house have to meet.

Most going on a beach holiday would be staying close to the resort, they would be spending money locally even if they were self catering, or camping. Some do leave their rubbish and that should not happen, as for regulating airbnbs we can start by regulating hotels, currently food premises are regulated but not accommodation, standards vary a lot.

Catterygirl

Just a suggestion. If you want to be the only tourist in town, try Sakarya in Turkey. I will be there next week.

We promise not to go next week so you can still be the only tourist there 😁

Have a lovely relaxing time.

This is a Europe wide, if not international problem. Only this week our local paper in Normandy had a list of all the seaside towns in the area that are now hiking house tax up byup to 60% for second house owners. One community with 900 house said 600 were second homes.

To be fair, before the fashion for seaside holidays started late in the 19th century Normans had no interest in the sea. All the villages were well inland and their seaside communities were built solely as tourist resorts. All the way up the penninsula, each parish has its plage(beach)community and its bourg (village) community, but now many of the village commu ities are seeing many of the houses become second homes.

PinkCosmos Why shouldn't tourists come for the day and sit on your beach? For many people a day at the seaside might be the only holiday they can afford.

In the 50s, as a child I lived between Weymouth and Portland. We had a little local beach but when my Dad was on holiday we went further afield. Weymouth beach was always crowded in the school summer holidays so we used to take a picnic and the whole family would go to a stony beach further along the coast. We travelled, 4 children plus dog and hamper in a sidecar and my parents on the motorbike.

Sometimes we went by train via Corfe Castle to Swanage we always went over the headland to the rocky side and spent hours rock pooling. We returned to Weymouth by boat.

Obviously that was in the days before foreign travel was available to the majority. It was possible to find less accessible beaches but that always involved a trek to get to them.

My most recent visit to a beach in the UK, I am not a beach bunny, was 2 years ago, to Great Yarmouth and the seaaside and town tourist shops seemed to be booming. Yes there were people on the beach with picnics, but plenty of people eating ice cream, candy floss, fish and chips, using boats on the boating pool, playing crazy golf. There were chalet parks and camping sites all quite busy.

When our DC were small, we could not afford to go to the sea for a day and buy everything needed when we got there. We would take picnics, and buy ice creams, that way we could have 3 days out, if we went empty handed and bought everything, one day was all we could afford.

I can quite understand why people from the Canary Islands have had enough of tourists.

If the homes where you lived were, in the main, out of the reach of local people, wouldn't you think it unfair?

I suppose it could be pointed out that successive governments have allowed and encouraged the over-expansion of tourism. It may have seen an obvious and easy way to bring money into the country, but the downside is that few other avenues of revenue have been pursued. So, much as I understand the, islanders' desperation and concern, I believe it is necessary to look for other streams of income before alienating tourists.

I read that in one of the Canary Islands - I believe it is Tenerife - two huge hotel complexes have been approved, on a large area of natural habitat. It has, naturally I think, caused anger.

Eloethan

I can quite understand why people from the Canary Islands have had enough of tourists.

If the homes where you lived were, in the main, out of the reach of local people, wouldn't you think it unfair?

Same applies in many places in the UK e.g the Lake District, Cornwall, Wales and many seaside locations. Locals can’t afford houses and second homes are often left empty for long periods or used as weekend get-aways by people who bring what they need with them or, shop in a supermarket on the way in rather than using the local shops.

Mollygo I can also understand why people in those areas of the UK are upset about it. It must be very annoying seeing houses left empty for significant periods of time, while locals cannot afford to buy a home. I think there should be measures brought in to make it much less attractive for people to buy second homes.

BlueBelle

Oh that’s awful Seadragon and although I ve been to the Canaries on a few occasions and enjoyed it I agree with you Allsorts the locals should come first in housing
These super liners are a blooming menace in my opinion (I can’t think of anything worse for a holiday )

Me neither. They are utterly horrific!

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The conundrum is tourism provides jobs, without jobs young people move away, if LAs want to keep more local young people increase tourism taxes and use the money to provide affordable housing.
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It’s not just tourist areas, in the UK even if they have jobs young families cannot afford rent or mortgages, there are not enough well paid jobs, they are mostly “service” jobs, often low skilled and to be honest with new technology I do not see well paid jobs being any easier to find in the future.

One thing for sure if you train for a skill you will find it easier to afford the rent.

RunaroundSue

Biting the hand that feeds them comes to mind.

Rather a short sighted viewpoint.

So, much as I understand the, islanders' desperation and concern, I believe it is necessary to look for other streams of income before alienating tourists.

Many years ago we were told by a local farmer on Tenerife that the new EU regulations had badly damaged his business. His bananas were no longer deemed straight enough to be acceptable for export.
The only way round it was they could be sold as "children's" bananas in supermarkets, he quoted Sainsbury's, as Canarian bananas are small and sweet.