To think Cornwall has gone down market?

[ispofbaid]

Not my opinion - that of my friend. She said she was down in West Cornwall for the bank holiday weekend and the crowd seems go have changed a lot over the last five years.

Nobody has mentioned the Germans. 10,000 of them come to Cornwall on Rosamunde Pilcher pilgrimages every year. I think it's lovely.

@CantDealwithChristmas

Plus Cornwall is so expensive as to be exclusionary. It's cheaper for us to fly to Spain for a week. Which is what we do instead.

Agreed. But, there is a wider discussion to be had about the destructive nature of mass tourism which is putting locals' backs up everywhere all over Europe. It's not sustainable, in it's current form. The tourism industry needs to change to become more considerate and preservative in nature, and people's attitudes also need to change - this whole culture we have at the moment of mass travel on a epic scale, huge cruise ships that offload hundreds of people in one afternoon to small coastal towns.

All Inclusive resorts are also a problem - whilst they do employ a lot of local people, they also wreck local businesses because people don't venture outside the resort. There needs to be a re-imagining of the impact these models of current tourism have on a local area. I honestly think it won'e be long before certain laws and restrictions come into place to manage flow of tourists to over-populated areas, and to introduce a more considerate ethos. They have to, in a way, as the big tour operators don't give a shit really about local people - they just care about securing numbers. And Air B&B's need to be a) more closely monitored and b) restricted by area. Some parts of Majorca are campaigning for action against AI resorts already.

I don't think Cornwall has ever been massively upmarket but in recent years has attracted more celebrity dwellers that adds appeal for some people.

I've been on a few AI holidays abroad and I agree it must decimate the local area and I did wonder if it would cease after the pandemic. It seems it hasn't.
Many places rely on tourists, but I can understand why they are also seen as a menace and not always welcome.
It is a bit of a double edged sword.

How do you feel about grockels??

Well, that's one way of looking at it. Sure, when I visited the Taj Mahal I was disappointed by the huge luxury coach which disgorged a small army of wealthy Middle Easterners who promptly blocked my and everyone else's view with their parasols and selfies.

I also didn't like the last time I went to Edinburgh to find the Royal Mile thrumming with Chinese determined to capture the perfect shot of the castle.

But then I'm from a country which NEEDS tourism to survive. We get Arabs, Russians, Germans, Scandis, Brits, the lot. We don't always like the rowdier ones but we welcome them with open arms because they bring us MONEY and they mean JOBS.

Travel has always happened and I love the fact that in the last 30 years it's become cheap enough that ordinary folk like me can do it too. I have no time for this 'over tourism' handwringing, which funnily enough always only seems to apply to working class white people daring to go on holiday and not the bien pensant who appreciate culture, dahhhling.

That was my first reaction too!

Although most of middle class Hampshire seems to holiday there. Does that make it upmarket - or do they just have a lack of imagination/originality?

I was in Conwy this afternoon, at the tea room there had a lovely chat with americans from the Chicago area.

Later on sat waiting for my lift outside, people watching there were a lot of Asians taking pictures of the buildings.

It felt very cosmopolitan.

How on earth are the words emmets or grockels racist? They're simply a term for tourist - which has existed for many decades - long before some of those tourists weren't white.

Unless you are assuming that the Cornish really are a race apart. But Devonians don't claim that - and they use grockel.

All the rich senior managers in our company go to Cornwall for a few weeks with their families.
We went once, camping. It was nice, but expensive and over rated.

This. Bloody irritating

so its the crowds - the tourists aren't the quality they used to be...

If your friend doesn't want to rub shoulders with hoy polloi then she needs to drastically. change her destination

@WithACatLikeTread

tourists in Devon and Cornwall aren't a race, yes its used as a derogatory term but its not racist

Cornwall used to be working class and that was what I enjoyed so much about it growing up.

So for those complaining that things have changed, they also changed when I was young whereby southerners tried to force Cornwall to be something that it's not.

Isn't Cornwall a whole county where people live and work from all walks of life, with every income level included. It's not a bar or pub that has changed hands. What a strange thing of your friend to say? I think she meant to say maybe that the partixular bit she has visited seems to have changed visitor demographic, and what does she define as downmarket? It's got even more expensive to go on holiday to Cornwall in recent years in my opinion so her comments must be based on people she saw out and about, did she not approve of their dress sense, behaviours or accents maybe? Who knows??? Maybe she is older and just out of touch or maybe it was one particular group she came across that were annoying, but you can't judge a whole county on the few people you saw walking about one weekend.

Emmets isn't a racist term........it means 'ants' and applies to tourists, of all nationalities.

We live in Bude. Every now and again we get professional comedians, recently from the comedy Store , down and it's always surprising how closed minded they are. How predictable.
Most of us do not farm tourists, we're professors , graphic artists, early WFH adopters. Once upon a time if there was a mine on the planet there was a Cornish man at the bottom of it. All those massive satellite dishes - I bet a bloke from Bude installed em and skateboarded in them.
Those uncomfortable benches at railway stations, designed and semi manufactured in Cornwall.
But tourists are a part of the landscape, we're mostly open minded but as I'm sure you'll appreciate, no one likes seeing their local area trashed or treated with bizarre tourist ownership.
Don't bury hot BBQs under the sand or get cross cos you've been ripped off by some shitty holiday let. Most Cornish people are just getting on with normal life and ferrying their kids about - our local scout group is Porth Emmett, you'll never find us.

Please do stay holidaying down in Cornwall while me and my tattoos enjoy the peace and empty beaches of all the beautiful holiday destinations up North.
Many thanks in advance.
Signed ‘A Northerner’

Emmets isn't a racist term........it means 'ants' and applies to tourists, of all nationalities.

the analogy with red ants would apply to those tourists that have got sunburn

What on earth is wrong with Northeners?
Your mate sounds like an arse.

I always assumed Devon was a bit posher than Cornwall.
Both beautiful parts of the country.

The bloody proletariat! They’re meant to be up north mining the coal.

"But, there is a wider discussion to be had about the destructive nature of mass tourism which is putting locals' backs up everywhere all over Europe. It's not sustainable, in it's current form. The tourism industry needs to change to become more considerate and preservative in nature, and people's attitudes also need to change "

But the cornish are in charge of how their tourism works... you can't really blame the visitors who come to spend money (be ripped off) every summer.

Don't worry national service will thin em out!

Camborne school of mining was pumping water out of pits before Northerners thought to looked under under their own arses.