Staycation is definitely here to stay (pardon the pun)
by Michael Smith (Veshengro)
The survey found that the number of British holidaymakers preferring to take a number of city breaks, coach day trips and weekends away rather than the conventional longer holidays is rapidly increasing. The main reasons are thought to be due to the desire to spend less money and spread holidays out over the year for a calendar full of getaways to look forward to.
City breaks remain as popular as ever, but the new staycation trend seems to be for seaside holidays with a round 40% of British holidaymakers planning trips to coastal destinations such as Cornwall, Devon, Whitby, Bournemouth and Brighton this summer.
The beauty of a staycation is that whether you are staying local or traveling to explore a different part of the country, you can embrace your own heritage and culture whilst finding what the surrounding cities and towns have to offer.
Over the last couple of years staycation has become the new way of spending the vacation instead of jetting abroad to what was, for some decades, the holiday destinations of choice, such as the Costa del Sol, and others, in Spain, the Canary Islands and France.
The Great Recession and the aftermath of it is certainly a major reason for the change in vacationing from abroad to at home, whether at home at home, if you get my meaning, or at some holiday destination in this country.
Many people in the UK who used to go abroad have never seen anything of this country, not even in the local area, and this is beginning to change and we are getting back to holidaying at resources and destinations in Britain or, in fact, are staying at home and exploring the local area – or a little further afield – returning to our nest in the evening.
Local parks and open spaces have seen a serious influx of visitors during the school holidays, almost, in some case, to the extent that it once was before the cheap flights to destinations abroad. But that was also a time when traveling within the country was rather cheap, in comparison to today where it is cheaper to fly to the South of Spain than to travel by train a hundred miles into the country.
Staycation means you vacation starts the moment you get up on your first day or, in fact, even on the evening before the first day, as you do not have to pack any suitcases, and such, and do not have to rush off to the airport to be there two to three hours before the plane is due to depart because of the the security checks and such. Thus you start your vacation relaxed and it will stay that way until the day it ends.
And, in addition to all that, especially if your staycation is done from your home base you do not have costs for accommodation and thus you save money as exploring the local area does not have to b e expensive. Furthermore there you create a much smaller environmental footprint by vacationing at home that by jetting off to somewhere hot.
Fund and relaxation can definitely be guaranteed with a staycation, the weather, in the UK especially, is a different story but especially when vacationing at home there is always something that can be done indoors or semi-indoors if and when the weather is not too favorable.
© 2014
