Madrid - Thousands of families are turning to Spain for their holidays amid the turmoil in Tunisia and Greece.
Around 300 000 Britons who had been planning to visit Tunisia have been left to look for alternatives, after the British government advised against travelling there following the recent terror attack.
At the same time, late bookings to Greece are down because of the country’s debt crisis. Many tourists worry they will not be able to withdraw money from cash machines, while hotels and restaurants are feared to be running low on some types of imported food.
Spain’s renewed popularity has come despite the Foreign Office raising the country’s terrorism threat level to “high” earlier this month.
Official advice says: “In 2015, Spanish police have disrupted a number of groups suspected of recruiting individuals to travel to Syria and Iraq. Some of them expressed an intention to carry out attacks in Europe.”
Around 15 million Britons visited Spain and its islands last year, up from 11 million in 2010. Spain’s popularity peaked in the 1970s when 17 million Britons visited each year – but it has since faced competition from more exotic destinations.
The country has been making efforts to improve the reputation and policing of its resorts, some of which have been viewed as downmarket and dangerous.
Benidorm – which inspired an ITV sitcom of the same name – saw its reputation plummet after the high-rise hotel boom of the 1970s and the influx of Club 18-30 British tourists.
But the city has now applied to the UN to be declared a World Heritage Site, alongside the Grand Canyon and the Great Wall of China.
And officials in Magaluf have brought in bans on drinking in the street and public nudity, hoping to rid the resort of its reputation for drunkenness and debauchery.
SEAN POULTER, Daily Mail