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Spain No Longer Foreign Enough For British Tourists

Fri, 19 Feb 2010

British holidaymakers and tourists are turning their backs on Spain as they no longer consider the county "foreign enough", new research has revealed.

A survey by online travel agent sunshine.co.uk found that the large number of UK tourists and English-themed bars and eateries in Spanish coastal resorts is starting to affect the nation’s long-standing status as one of the most popular holiday destinations among Brits.

Some 59 per cent of the 1,327 people questioned in the survey said that Spain was no longer foreign enough, although nearly a third (32 per cent) said they enjoyed the sense of familiarity that they got from British pubs and bars.

As a result, Spain and its Canary Islands both featured a list of the five destinations that have seen the least growth in bookings on the sunshine.co.uk website.

In contrast, the travel portal revealed that Egypt is the most frequently booked destination on the site, followed by Greece, the USA, Turkey and Portugal .

Commenting on the findings, Chris Brown, co-founder of sunshine.co.uk, said: "Some of the reasons people gave for not wanting to holiday in certain places were very amusing, especially in the instance of the one respondent who was afraid of birds and as a result didn’t want to go to the Canaries ."

"The fact that a select few would visit Turkey for a traditional kebab is rather funny, but some of the reasons, such as Spain not being so popular for being "too English" were more common."

"On the contrary however, some did actually like the idea of Spain being a bit more familiar. I suppose in the case of holidays, everyone has different preferences."

According to data from the Spanish Tourism Institute, the number of UK tourists who made a trip to Spain in 2009 year fell 15 per cent from the previous year.
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