A “memory” recently slid into my Facebook feed. It was a post from a year ago, when Spain had just begun a fortnight’s lockdown. No leaving the house other than for food and medicine. No school, no socialising, no outside exercise, no outside anything. We couldn’t quite believe it. How would we cope with two whole weeks stuck indoors? It turned out to be ten.
Friends and family in the UK expressed concern for our plight. We were stoical and compliant, but hugely relieved once it lifted.
It wasn’t long, though, until talk in the Balearics turned to tourism. Easter was a write-off, but could summer still be saved? The Spanish government gave the green light to allow about 2,000 German visitors to test safety protocols. Mallorca, always at the forefront of Europe’s tourist industry, was the proving ground for resuscitating it.
Suffice to say, it didn’t end well. But we can’t lay all the blame on this scheme, as naive as it may look to us now. After lockdown, we’d already opened to travel from the mainland and Madrileños were arriving in droves, pouring in from the Covid hotspot that was the Spanish capital. Infection rates in the Balearics, which had been some of Spain’s lowest, swiftly soared.
Despite all the anxiety and uncertainty, however, there was an undeniable boon for those of us living here. It’s no secret that Mallorca suffers from a serious case of overtourism. Hooked on the reliable flow of cash, the island strains at the seams every summer — at the last count, arrivals approached ten million people a year. In peak season, those of us not involved in tourism give the holiday hotspots a wide berth, or leave the island altogether.
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Yet last summer Mallorca’s coastline was gloriously uncrowded. Visiting a popular spot would have been previously unthinkable. So it would be a shameless porky to say that some of us haven’t relished a practically tourist-free island.
A year on, however, there’s a distinct feeling of déjà vu. The announcement last month that we would open up to German tourists before Easter caused bemusement and anger. Spaniards are not presently allowed to travel between regions, but more than 40,000 foreigners were expected in the Balearics over the Easter break — most from a country reporting another viral surge.
Perhaps in some misguided bid to mollify concerns about increased contagion, the national government declared masks should be worn on the beach. Cue an instant backlash and a swift climbdown. But the fact remains that our over-reliance on tourism makes us far more likely to jump the gun.
According to SOS Turismo, a lobbying group representing almost 900 tourist-industry organisations across the Balearics, the islands’ GDP fell by a whopping 25 per cent last year. It is pushing for a more effective response from politicians, and faster lifting of the measures hampering recovery. But not everyone thinks the same way. I’ve spoken to hoteliers who are happy to welcome guests again, but others are frustrated at the decision to open for Easter — a move that could jeopardise the more lucrative summer season.
All visitors have to present a negative PCR result on arrival, but the German press has reported two tourists testing positive and they are now holed up in Palma’s quarantine hotel. Not covered by medical insurance, their extended stay will certainly become a costly one.
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So opening up now may prove to have been an expensive gamble for those travelling here and for the island itself. And though some of us have enjoyed tourist-lite Mallorca, it’s a guilty pleasure considering the havoc being wreaked on lives and livelihoods here. Once more, we have some of the lowest cases per capita in Spain, but with first-dose vaccination rates languishing around the 10 per cent mark, we feel all the more vulnerable.
Some fear that the island won’t cope with a second year lost to Covid. But if we don’t proceed with caution, recovery could — like that first lockdown — drag on much longer than we expect.
Leon Beckenham is a journalist in Palma
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