2020 holiday tribes: which one are you?
The staycation purists
“Staycation” used to mean holidaying in your own house. Purists take the term at its original meaning. A Telegraph survey this week showed that half of Britons have adopted an all-or-nothing mindset and won’t even take a UK holiday this year. The Costa del Home it is.
They should be: Rambling around Greek ruins and patronising locals. No pointing at chips on a laminated menu, here: they’d be making a huge show of dining at “unspoilt” tavernas, cooing at fresh fish and plump olives. Instead they’re: Convincing themselves it’s “fun” to stay home, even though they’ve been stuck there since March. Stay-at-homers mention “quality family time”, “appreciating what’s on our doorstep” and say “Ah, this is the life” a lot. They secretly wish they were drunk on a beach, but are too stubborn to admit it.
The unhappy campers
Urban snowflakes forced to book a campsite out of necessity. It will be an adventure, they tell themselves. The great outdoors! Stargazing! Scrabble by lamplight! Cooking over flame like one of those laddish TV chefs! The reality doesn’t quite match the idyllic fantasy. Cue rows more blazing than the weedy campfire. They’ll kid themselves they’re “glamping”, but draping a string of tatty bunting across a bog-standard tent is fooling nobody. They should be: Somewhere, anywhere, with brick walls and a proper roof.
Instead they’re: Being eaten alive by insects, spooked by every nocturnal noise and woken up by snoring. They’ll admit defeat, pack up and go home early. Just to beat the traffic, you understand.
The panicked barrel-scrapers
They tried their best in the great staycation scramble, but everywhere was fully booked or preposterously overpriced. Under pressure from their judgmental partner, they booked the only place they could find. Now they face a fortnight in a drab caravan park or run-down B&B on a ring road.
They should be: Savouring the more-than-you-can-eat buffets and on-site childcare of an all-inclusive resort. Sure, they might never venture beyond its chain-link fence, but they just need to flop by a pool with the new Jack Reacher and chill. “We’ll do something more adventurous next year. OK, we won’t.”
Instead they’re: Putting a brave face on what’s clearly a total disaster and trying to avoid divorce proceedings.
Finding decent holiday lets in the UK is like getting your hands on the last loo roll in Waitrose
“Let’s make the best of it, love, shall we? Please stop looking at me like that.”
The smug pre-bookers
Seaside cottagers and country housers who sorted it yonks ago. Finding decent holiday lets in the UK is like getting your hands on the last loo roll in Waitrose, but they’ll faux-modestly explain how they “just took a gamble” during lockdown and booked a “super little Airbnb” for “literally nothing”. Don’t open the link they send you, it’ll make you want to smash the screen. They should be: “Taking a house” in France or Italy where they find everything “totally charming”. “You really must meet our hosts, you’d love them. They said we can go back any time we like.”
Instead they’re: Treating Cornwall or the Cotswolds like it’s jaw-droppingly exotic. They’ll point at things, clap delightedly and take pics of confusedlooking locals.
The in-denial pretenders
so heartbroken by the cancellation of their foreign jaunt, they’ve been bleating about it like it’s a tragedy on a par with the actual pandemic. Having thrown money at the problem, they’re keeping calm and carrying on as if abroad like usual.
They should be: Braying over continental breakfast in what they insist is a “boutique hotel” in the Med, even though it’s just a hotel. Instead they’re: Guzzling rosé like it’s tap water and eating the British waters out of seafood, while posting social media snaps so filtered that it looks like they’ve smeared Ambre Solaire on the lens, with captions like: “Who needs Europe? Can you believe this is Dorset?! #blessed.” Retouching can hide the gunmetal grey sea, right?
The borrowed second-homers
Grateful families lucky enough to have wealthier friends who aren’t using their rural bolt-hole.
They should be: Scoffing poolside paella at that place in Marbella they’d booked. Bah humbug.
Instead they’re: Getting suspicious looks from locals who already resent the second-homers, let alone these subletting interlopers. They don’t know which local shop sells sourdough and will make out they’re voluntarily having a “digital detox” but they just haven’t got the Wi-fi code. All those walks are actually to find a phone signal.
The Euro rebels
Unperturbed by “Project Fear”, they’re saying “sod it” and jetting off abroad anyway. They should be: Losing their sanity after getting gazumped for a staycation cottage in the Lake District. Instead they’re: Shrugging their shoulders and snapping up a bargain break overseas. You never know, quarantine might well have lifted in a fortnight anyway and they’re nothing if not risk-takers. Pass the Piz-buin and Aperol Spritz…