Hotter than Marbella!
As thousands descend on UK’s beaches in record 83F heat, holidaymakers in storm-hit Spain trade bikinis for brollies
BLAZING sunshine delivered the hottest August Bank Holiday on record yesterday and saw sunseekers flock to Britain’s beaches.
But if you were among those who enjoyed the heat, spare a thought for those on holiday in Spain, where storms led to floods and deserted beaches.
As the mercury hit 28.2C (83F) in the UK, holidaymakers on the Costa del Sol swapped their bikinis for raincoats and umbrellas as torrential rain and lightning swept in.
In Ibiza, a child’s lilo had to be used to surf the streets after the Mediterranean party island was hit by downpours. The resorts of Marbella, Malaga and Puerto Banus also got a soaking.
It was a far cry from the glorious scenes on Bournemouth beach, as the sunshine mixed with warm air drawn from continental Europe.
Every single one of the resort’s 3,000 deckchairs and 1,800 sunbeds were rented out and the seafront car parks were full by lunchtime.
Newquay, in Cornwall, was similarly packed with surfers, while on the Brecon Beacons in Wales, visi- tors in shorts and T-shirts enjoyed strolls under the beating sun.
Elsewhere the beach at Lyme Regis, in West Dorset, filled up within three hours of opening and London’s parks were a sea of sunbathers and sizzling barbecues.
However it was not all sunshine for the 18million drivers caught up in traffic jams. Traffic England logged 17 incidents and motorists told of ten-mile tailbacks, particularly around coastal hotspots. Jack Cousens, head of roads policy for the AA, said: ‘With schools opening their doors again in two weeks’ time, and with the absence of a real summer, families felt it was worth the hassle trying to get to the coast and battle the traffic chaos in the late summer sun.’
Yesterday’s top temperature of 28.2C was logged at 5pm in Holbeach, Lincolnshire. It beat Malaga’s 26C (79F), and Mumbai, where it was 27C (81F). It also tops the last August Bank Holiday record of 27.2C (81F), set in East Bergholt, Suffolk, in 1984. The late August Bank Holiday dates back to 1965.
The Met Office said it will be another fine day of high temperatures for the South East today, but warned many areas will see a return to gloom and drizzle.
Forecaster Craig Snell said: ‘Today we will see a fairly weak band of rain move across from the North East to the South East. The rain on it will be very patchy drizzle, but there will be a marked slip in temperature and it will feel a lot fresher. The South East will have another warm day, we could see 28C (82F). But up towards Cumbria we will be seeing temperatures around 19C (66F).’
In Spain yesterday, tourists told how their holidays had been ruined. Mark Ryan, 26, from Brighton, who had flown to the Costa del Sol, said: ‘The last thing I had thought of packing for Spain in August was an umbrella.’
Amy Blunt, 35, who flew from London to Puerto Banus, added: ‘I told my friends I’d come back with a tan that would make them dead jealous but with the weather back home, they’re likely to be browner than me.’
Yesterday several UK flights to Malaga had to be diverted after parts of the resort were flooded.
There was confusion last night over the record because of a ‘suspect’ reading in Cambridgeshire in 1990, where 28.3C was noted. But that did not tally with other local readings, invalidating the result, the Met Office said.