Tourists exodus today relieved

[justasking111]

Well it's over today the tsunami of tourists will be gone.

We have never experienced such, rudeness, aggressive behaviour from them as we have this summer. Our businesses have limped along short staffed, been abused, threatened as have locals. The littering has been something else.

I know everyone has had a bad year but so have the Welsh our lockdowns harder and longer than others.

We still wear masks in shops fgs

So hopefully you all had good holidays but glad of a bit of peace now

We live in a tourist area South East. Locals have stayed the hell away from the beach and seafront this year. There have been gangs coming down from London going after each other with knives on many evenings which makes for a nasty atmosphere. Also large groups of people on the beach with loud music smoking weed. It's not somewhere I want to take children this year

When I moved here it was quiet. We had tourists but not hoards. Things change. I am not moving .

All this guff about the money.
In fact very few locals benefit.
We would prefer to have our peace and quiet back.

I am suspecting that the shite attitudes towards hospitality staff has grown by the ones that usually go abroad WHERE LOCALS MIGHT WANT YOUR MONEY because they do not have a welfare state safety net.
In the UK we do not need your crap. You use local resources and don't pay for them
One example the SW has the highest water bills to cover Beach Cleaning.......for tourists.
These days many so called local businesses are actually owned by incomers.
Accomodation is hard to buy or rent because of holiday homes especially the ones raking in money from tourists

Well I’m an Airbnb home stay host and it has been manic but brilliant with lovely and considerate guests. I’m proud to be contributing in a very small way to the British tourism industry.

I live in a tourist area in the South West and I am ashamed of the way that some places have behaved towards their customers.

One tearoom for example more than doubled their prices for poor quality food, providing a lack of service and I witnessed them being rude to their customers. (She refused to swap a coffee with a tea for a cream tea and I think their bill was about £50). They do have the monopoly in this area. It's shortsighted though because people remember this when it comes to opting for UK hols versus holidaying abroad in the future.

I agree with PP who said the locals want the tourists gone but don't leave without handing over the tourist dollar!

We are all visitors somewhere, sometimes. Unless you’re an actual recluse. Tourism is an important part of the economy, local and national. I’m appalled by the abuse you have suffered. As have many in non tourist sectors.
But be careful what you wish for...

I imagine it’s been so much busier this summer and must be frustrating for those living in tourist areas, but I think it’s unfair to suggest everyone who has holidayed in the UK this year has been rude/littered etc. We holiday in the UK every year, have done since DCs were born, and are just as polite on holiday as we are at home.

We’ve not yet taken the kids to Wales as DP says that they hate the English and wouldn’t be very welcoming. I’ve always argued that it’s nonsense, but judging by this post perhaps not….

Totally agree with you @justasking111
There has been a subsection of tourists this year that have been very angry about anything not quite to their liking.
I don't think it has helped that farmers etc have been able to open up fields for camping as the additional visitors all have to park somewhere to get to the beaches.
Devon and Cornwall reached capacity and then some. We've also had 'friends' we've not seen for years suddenly 'thinking of visiting you' when they can't find anywhere to stay or don't want to payup. Some people I know have had 'visitors' staying with them non-stop over the Summer with one group arriving as the previous ones depart. Soooo many people and no more resources so everything takes longer and is more difficult and some people are so angry.

I'm certainly glad to see the end of the tourist season. There are now more cases of covid in Cornwall than in any other part of the UK. Our hospital (yes singular) is overrun. I do not understand why this has been allowed to occur when areas in the North West had local lockdowns when the figures were much, much lower. In May, before G7 the figure here was 4/100,000, it is now 850/100,000. The economy has overriden health concerns and it will be a long time before the county recovers (and some might not ).
I'm sorry if I sound ungrateful but actually the tourist buck doesn't spread far and the resistance towards any kind of development that would create real jobs is based on fear of losing it. For once I'm looking forward to winter.

Seems like those who live in tourist areas are glad they are going, those who visit feel put out. I’m in the first camp, happy to wave them all out

I live in Wales and I wouldn’t like to compare our lockdown suffering to others and claim we’ve had it so much worse. I think the whole of the UK and world for that matter have struggled.

I’d also like to thank all the English, Scottish and Northern Irish (as well as other Welsh) tourists that have come to prop up our economy. Our 20 miles+ area of Wales relies on tourism and this town wouldn’t be here without it.

Some of us appreciate you. There’s good and bad everywhere.

@Frazzledstar1

I imagine it’s been so much busier this summer and must be frustrating for those living in tourist areas, but I think it’s unfair to suggest everyone who has holidayed in the UK this year has been rude/littered etc. We holiday in the UK every year, have done since DCs were born, and are just as polite on holiday as we are at home.

We’ve not yet taken the kids to Wales as DP says that they hate the English and wouldn’t be very welcoming. I’ve always argued that it’s nonsense, but judging by this post perhaps not….

Well as the OP I can say that I'm not Welsh many who live in Wales aren't and most of the Welsh are very welcoming. There is a rumbling always from a vociferous few in a corner of the country but they slag off East walians, mid walians and south walians. Sigh..

I really don’t understand the mentality of people in tourist spots who think like the OP.

I live in London, there’s been a lot more people from throughout the UK visiting this year than there would be normally. And I can only see that this is a massive benefit. Give me a crowded tube carriage and a slightly longer queue at tourist attractions any day, if it means people are getting a holiday and businesses are doing well.

I just don’t understand the ‘them and us’ attitude of some people. Complaining that “their” hospital in Cornwall or wherever is being overrun due to tourist numbers. It would simply never occur to me to get annoyed that some of the patients at my local London hospital are families visiting from Manchester, businesspeople from Birmingham etc.

@AlistairCamel

I find your post strange and divisive. It’s quite ‘othering’. I don’t think anyone has suggested the Welsh haven’t had a tough time. I don’t think you are that different from any other group of people in Britain. We’ve all struggled in various ways. There is a need to have competitive suffering.

I am sorry you’ve had a difficult time, especially with tourists but I find your post odd.

I work in a shop in wales... the OP isnt lying, the tourists has been beyond unpleasant at the least and actively aggressive at best......I have personally been threatened for asking them nicely to please wear a mask, to be told countless reasons why they dont have to , spat at, my car kicked , the shop windows punched, you name it they've done it. I get that folks are at breaking point with all of this, as we all are, but think the extortionate prices they have been charged for holidays that probably havent met their perfect expectations in their minds have a lot to do with some of the attitudes, but there has definately been a surge in a certain type of person who will do what they want no matter what. Thanks to people like that I have just gone through 3 weeks off my 2 pounds an hr BELOW minimum wage job with Covid, can only have been caught in work as I go nowhere else, no sick or hol pay for me, and I dont know how I am going to make the rent this month. I HAVE to go back to work but I really really dont want to

I live in London and I can’t wait for the tourists to come back. But then we’re pretty cool about ‘outsiders’ down here. If people were complaining - maybe the service was shite?

@Sittingonthedockofthebay

I'm with you, Cornwall has put up with some absolute tossers this summer, apparently all "on holiday" from Covid. Our infection rate has gone through the roof and our nhs overrun by them. Icing on the cake for me was the man who clubbed a seagull to death with a child's shovel on the beach in front of families and children. We have been in all summer as a result.

It’s not ‘your’ NHS though. The clue is in the N. You’d all be on benefits if it weren’t for tourism. If you don’t like it - move.

@changingstages

These threads ALWAYS go like this. So all of you jumping in to say 'happy to take the tourist dollar, eh'? think this sounds like reasonable behaviour? It's ok to treat people like this because you're on holiday? Vile.

You are 100% right. I live in a very touristy area & this year has been awful. I have friends who have stayed here year after year who have all said that if this year was their first visit they’d never come back. We have been swamped with ill-mannered, downright nasty people. I had a friend who was physically assaulted by one holiday-maker because his delivery arrived late & SHE had starved his kids. The fact that she managed it at all considering cars had been left all over the village road was a miracle. I feel very sorry for the towns these people usually go to.

I keep reading complaints about places in Wales (as we're going in a couple of weeks) that the service is dire because they have don't have the staff or half the things on the menu aren't available due to delivery problems. Better to cancel in advance or reduce numbers if you can't cope/cater properly for people, maybe then they wouldn't seem so rude. The cost of holidaying in the UK is huge, the weather is generally very disappointing, roads and parking are a nightmare - to then find half the things on the menu aren't available and there's no one to take your order for half an hour and it's not surprising people are getting a bit annoyed.

The smug Londoners are hilarious- the tourists don't double your population. The idea that people in Wales and the SW exist to service smug Londoners (who liie in the suburbs and don't encounter the groups who photograph themselves outside Buckingham palace- imagine if it was literally up your garden path and your front door) and shoiuld be grateful for their cash is appalling. I think it's abundantly clear who some of the entitled twats are.
Tourism as it stands is unsustainable- we all will need to think about where we go and the impact it has on the communities we visit and the environment. Some of the attitudes here are grim.
You can see it where people have special Cornwall wardrobes specially for clicking their fingers at some fisherman or farm labourer's son on daughter studying and earning cash for themselves- they should be grateful for the opportunity don't you know?

What a shame, I went to Wales and couldn’t fault the local staff. Absolutely wonderful, so friendly and so pleased to be back up and running and seeing tourists again after a dreadful year.

We are in Scotland and it has been exactly the same, no idea where the tourists came from this year but I suspect they probably holiday abroad on an all inclusive holiday and are expecting the same when holidaying in Britain. Sadly you can't compare the two.

People have had and still have periods of real stress. They then go on holiday and get not so good service which stresses them out even more. If you think it is okay to call them knuckle draggers on here, there is a good chance that is what you think when dealing with people, and then you wonder why they react to your terrible attitude.

I live in a very beautiful tourist area that sadly now has an extremely high rate of covid.

It's been chaotic with the volume of tightly packed, unmasked tourists combined with staff going off sick. Tents are pitched and tourists are camped out on every available field. There are hundreds upon hundreds.

I don't often venture out until after 7pm when most of the beaches are empty.

It's doubly busy this year with people trying to stay in the UK. The few times I've had to drive into town It's been hard to see the sand between families and it's impossible to walk in town without being bumped into and jostled.

As people return to their less infected counties, we now have been left to face extremely high covid numbers. Schools returning next week with no isolation rules for under 18's and minimal medical infrastructure should the elderly and vulnerable need assistance.

And yes to the person who pointed out it's a National Health Service, but that's not a lot of use when there is a single major hospital. Getting people moved to the next hospital would means hours of driving on poor roads to the next county, it's really not close or easy.

Who put this idiotic policy through? It's about as clever as the earlier advice saying masks are useless but you should wash your hands, for a virus with aerosol transmission.

I'm feeling quite upset today after following the huge rise in cases locally. The whole of the South West is dark purple on the covid maps. With school children taking this local infection into confined classrooms with no masks and no isolation, cases are about to quadruple.

A better solution would have been to extend restrictions for longer until the summer crush had finished.

Those people who are facilitating the holidays of the holiday makers have also gone through, and are still living, through periods of very real stress. It's not okay to take out your stress on those who are serving you through very difficult situations of supply issues - both of goods and of manpower. To do so, is to have a terrible, and very entitled attitude.

I live in a heavily tourist area. You always know the tourists as they never smile, never say hello as you pass. I’m sure the OP has a point though can’t know what it was like to live anywhere else.

@beautifullymad

I live in a very beautiful tourist area that sadly now has an extremely high rate of covid.

It's been chaotic with the volume of tightly packed, unmasked tourists combined with staff going off sick. Tents are pitched and tourists are camped out on every available field. There are hundreds upon hundreds.

I don't often venture out until after 7pm when most of the beaches are empty.

It's doubly busy this year with people trying to stay in the UK. The few times I've had to drive into town It's been hard to see the sand between families and it's impossible to walk in town without being bumped into and jostled.

As people return to their less infected counties, we now have been left to face extremely high covid numbers. Schools returning next week with no isolation rules for under 18's and minimal medical infrastructure should the elderly and vulnerable need assistance.

And yes to the person who pointed out it's a National Health Service, but that's not a lot of use when there is a single major hospital. Getting people moved to the next hospital would means hours of driving on poor roads to the next county, it's really not close or easy.

Who put this idiotic policy through? It's about as clever as the earlier advice saying masks are useless but you should wash your hands, for a virus with aerosol transmission.

I'm feeling quite upset today after following the huge rise in cases locally. The whole of the South West is dark purple on the covid maps. With school children taking this local infection into confined classrooms with no masks and no isolation, cases are about to quadruple.

A better solution would have been to extend restrictions for longer until the summer crush had finished.

Yes! This, exactly this! Fantastic NATIONAL health service that has 1 major hospital in an entire county and the next nearest one in Plymouth (which could be a 2.5 hour drive away if you have a car to use) is struggling too. But hey, I’m sure it’s great nationally when you can just nip to the next town for medical attention.