“Benidorm Island” is an initiative started by the Valencian government and visit Benidorm to propose a safe health corridor for British tourism for this autumn 2020.

The concept of a “safe and visitable island” has the support of the Valencian Provincial Council and Comunitat Valenciana Tourism Board, and aspires to achieve a safe corridor. They will need to gain the support from the governments of both Spain and the United Kingdom.

It outlines the work that is needed to be carried out to demonstrate Benidorm’s safety. A Hospitality Team would be monitoring and providing support to tourists, up to 14 days after their departure, which is the main selling point of their plan.

Benidorm has presented its “Benidorm Island” proposal. It hopes to offer a safe tourist destination that behaves like and is treated like an island in order to regain its position in the British market. They have highlighted ways in which tourists would be contained to Benidorm as though it’s an island, rather than be treated as part of mainland Spain. This may include monitoring of movement.

It also includes designated “safe transfers”, collecting tourists meaning that tourists will have to take the designated bus to the resort to ensure that visitors don’t take transport to another location in Spain. They are talking about rolling out a test with 500 people.

Update: it seems the idea will be to host tour operator style holidays here. You would be collected at the airport by the hospitality team who would ensure you take the safe bus to Benidorm. You would be taken to one of the hotels in Benidorm and have a member of the team available. This means anybody who isn’t with the bubble group as part of Benidorm island would still be subject to quarantine. It’s only those who have had the regimented bubble scheme would avoid quarantine which seems a good idea for those who would like to come away, sit round the pool, visit the bars and the beach in a regimented way and not have to do quarantine. It would also be designated, cooperating hotels that would be the accommodation.

It was stated that its aspiration is to offer the Benidorm tourist activity with a series of security measures and high levels of testing. “Benidorm Island is a real strong proposal,” said the mayor, Toni Perez.

The proposal is adaptable for the rest of the Costa Blanca and can be replicated and adapted for other tourist destinations in our community.

The details of the initiative are available on the Visit Benidorm website through http://www.benidormisland.com and, as explained by the manager Leire Bilbao, Benidorm’s proposal is to propose a safe destination in bubble format and extraordinary measures that can be summarized, she highlighted, in swapping testing for quarantine in the only ‘island’ that operates for the British market during the winter in peninsular territory.

The main idea is to treat Benidorm as an island, hence the Benidorm island title, and to swap out quarantine for a huge investment in regular testing of tourists, similar to other destinations who are able to provide a reliable test which provides accurate data within hours, rather than home testing which can take days.

This may be a long shot, but it’s nice to see the government and the tourism board still investing in the Benidorm tourism and continuing to show hope moving forward.

What do you think? Do you think they’ll be a safe corridor?

I translated this press release from Spanish to English to provide up to date news about the situation here in Benidorm. This blog is entirely self funded so any tips to PayPal.me/imlaurenbate are greatly appreciated. Thank you.