In June, a British tourist successfully sued his travel company for \u00a3750 because they\u2019d sent him to a resort in Greece which (in his opinion) had \u2018too many Germans\u2019. Das Bild, the Federal Republic\u2019s leading tabloid newspaper, retaliated by publishing a list of holiday destinations to be avoided \u2013 all British dominated. These included San Antonio (Ibiza), Playa de la s Americas (Tenerife) and Faliraki (Rhodes). It also mocked Britain\u2019s cuisine, binge-drinking and inability to take football penalties. According to a recent \u2018Expedia\u2019 survey, however, the British are no longer \u2018the world\u2019s worst tourists\u2019. That status, assessed on\u00a0 the basis of impoliteness, Untidiness, noise and unwillingness to attempt the local language now belongs to the French. The British have dropped to fifth in this league behind the Indians, Chinese and Russians though with their \u2018socks and sandals\u2019 image are still considered the second \u2018worst-dressed tourists\u2019 after the Americans. The Japanese are regarded as the best-behaved.<\/p>\n
In 2007, UK residents made about 70 million visits abroad, almost half as \u2018package holidays\u2019. A Norwich Union \u2018 Holiday Habits\u2019 report has concluded that a third of Britons know little about the customs of the country they are going to and don\u2019t bother to learn even the most useful basic phrases. Those heading for the tropics often \u2018gamble with their health\u2019 by not being vaccinated before departure or neglect to take anti-malaria pills with them. Once they arrive, they face other problems. The introduction of chip & pin technology has (contrary to the supposed objective) led to a significant increase in credit and debit card fraud abroad. 400,000 British holiday-makers were victims in 2007, double the average of the previous four years. Thousands also end up in police cells or in hospital instead of on the beach, invariably due\u00a0 to drinking\u00a0 more alcohol than they are accustomed to back home. In Spain, 1,549 Britons were arrested last year while on vacation . In the USA: 1,368. Cyprus: 330. Many others either lost their passports or had them stolen, mostly in Spain (6,078), followed by the USA (3,064) and Germany (1,236). The UK Embassy in the Czech Republic receives frequent night-time phone calls from participants in hen and stag parties who have mislaid their documents, cash and even their clothes.<\/p>\n
75% of British pre-wedding celebrations now take places abroad (mainly Eastern Europe), the most popular venues being Talinn (Estonia), Bratislava (Slovakia), Prague and Berlin. One in four of these occasions (according to Foreign Office statistics) results in anti-social disorder requiring the intervention of both the local police and British consular staff.. Even the over 55\u2019s\u00a0 seem to cast their discretion aside on foreign holidays. One in five takes risks they wouldn\u2019t contemplate at home: bungee-jumping, water-skiiing and riding mopeds. If uninsured, they have to pay for any consequent medical treatment.<\/p>\n
There are signs that the \u2018credit crunch\u2019 and the decline in the value of the pound from\u00a0 1.50 euros to under 1.20\u00a0 is already having an impact on travel to continental Europe. Travelodge research has also found that 50% of Britons are prepared to reduce their flights abroad to help the environment. Over 27 million people\u00a0 will visit the UK coastline this year (weather permitting).. Devon & Newquay (South \u2013West England) Brighton & Bournemouth (South Coast) and Scarborough & Blackpool in the north are the most popular English\u00a0 destinations. This resurgence of the traditional seaside holiday is having one unforeseen consequence \u2013 the depletion of sand on the country\u2019s beaches. Each person arriving by car inadvertently takes home 5.95kg of it in their towels, shoes, clothes, blankets and hair. That\u2019s a total of 160,650,000kg of valuable British sand disappearing every year.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
In June, a British tourist successfully sued his travel company for \u00a3750 because they\u2019d sent him to a resort in Greece which (in his opinion) had \u2018too many Germans\u2019. Das Bild, the Federal Republic\u2019s leading tabloid newspaper, retaliated by publishing a list of holiday destinations to be avoided \u2013 all British dominated. These included San […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[18],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-51","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-travel"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/colindgordon.co.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/51","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/colindgordon.co.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/colindgordon.co.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/colindgordon.co.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/colindgordon.co.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=51"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/colindgordon.co.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/51\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":538,"href":"https:\/\/colindgordon.co.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/51\/revisions\/538"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/colindgordon.co.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=51"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/colindgordon.co.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=51"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/colindgordon.co.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=51"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}