The Tourism Department of Calp Town Council already has preliminary data on occupancy in this strange season, and everything suggests that the tourist who owns a second house in the municipality and the Spanish tourist were decisive in the number of visitors this summer.
The City Council has made a comparison of water consumption and solid waste production in June, July and August 2019 and 2020, and the conclusion is that the differences in this season are not too different. For example, in the month of August 2020, 13.2% less was consumed than in the previous year and 18% less waste was generated in the month of August than in 2019.
The Councillor for Tourism, Paco Avargues, explains that "the owners of villas and flats in Calp have decided this season to move into their second homes in the months of June, July and August, given the existing health conditions. It should be noted that, although Calp has a very varied range of accommodation, a large proportion of it is occupied by tourists who have a second home in Calp. The number of Spanish tourists has also increased this year.
In addition, the tourism department already has preliminary data on the occupancy of hotels, flats, villas and campsites and "although the figures are inevitably down on previous seasons, the truth is that this decline is not as strong as initially feared".
The alarm ended on 21 June and domestic and foreign citizens were able to start their holiday plans, with occupancy rates for this month reaching 14% in hotels, 6% in flats and villas and 10% on campsites.
In July, hotel occupancy reached 44.69% compared to 90% last year, 30% in flats and villas compared to 59% last year and 31.35% on campsites compared to 33% last year. It should be noted that the summer months are considered the low season for campsites.
In August, hotel occupancy reached 50.61% compared to 73% in 2019, occupancy in villas and rented flats reached 50.88 compared to 74.98 last year and campsites reached 49.50% occupancy this August compared to 61.60% last year.
The head of the Tourism Department, Paco Avargues, says that "within the exceptional circumstances we are in, within the bad situation we expected, expectations were met, although it was a strange season in which the industry was very much affected, since the conclusions within the local tourism sector are that the season was better than we expected".