A once beautiful beach in Benidorm, popular among those looking for some peace, has now been slammed by tourists for being dirty and noisy.
Benidorm, in Alicante, Spain, is known for its big British tourist crowd, partly due to its association with the hit 2007 sitcom of the same name – and it’s also insanely popular with expats, as well as stag and hen dos.
The “British” area of Benidorm is known to be concentrated around Levante beach due to its rowdy pubs and bars. For those looking to get away from this, it is often suggested that tourists make the trip, 15-minutes by car or a 55-minute walk, to Platja de Ponent, or Poniente beach.
At over three kilometres long, it is the longest beach in the resort town.
However, one reviewer wrote in November 2023 that there was a “band of rotting seaweed about 10 metres wide”, with “no attempt [made] to remove it”.
This was clearly not a new phenomenon, as in July 2022 another reviewer complained that “maintenance has decreased”, with the “deep clean of the sand… no longer performed.”
On Platja de Ponent, a wide range of services and leisure facilities can be found, including floating platforms, sports, six playgrounds and a beach library.
It appears, however, that uncleanliness is not the only concern of reviewers, as this British noise associated with Levante has begun encroaching on this beach also.
In February 2020, one particularly frustrated reviewer wrote on TripAdvisor: “If you wish to avoid foul-mouthed, drunken Brits and are able to make it there, go down to the far end of Poniente beach.”
They continued: “The final straw for me… was while lying down reading and minding my own business, I was forcefully hit in the face by a leather football, the kid who kicked it thought it was a great laugh as did his mother, how on earth have we managed to produce so many of these cretins in our once great country?”
Another review from two years earlier complained of the same problem: “far too busy for young children,” they wrote, “it’s a mission to get anywhere because it is so jam-packed [so] ended up leaving!
They warned to avoid the beach between 6.30am and 9pm if wanting to avoid the crowds, which does not leave a lot of hours for holidaymakers.
In the 1950s, it was once an unspoilt beach, less-known due to less tourist exploitation than Levante and it being a more residential area with less urban density. However, the growing tourism in the last 70 years appears to have changed that scene quite dramatically.
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