Alberto Lejarraga
A FOUR-STAR Costa del Sol hotel reportedly hired a bouncer to prevent Brits and other tourists from fighting over sunbeds.
Sunset Beach Club, in Benalmadena, between Malaga and Marbella, is using a security guard to keep holidaymakers under control.
The drastic measures have been implemented to stop guests from playing dirty pool to get their badly wanted sunbeds.
“There is a queue of over 100 people waiting to access the pool in the morning and, at 9am, when the gate opens, some people don’t use the gate and just jump over the fence,” Katherine Green, a 35-year-old mum from Yorkshire told the Olive Press.
Green insisted: “We need to get down shortly after 8am to guarantee a spot as there are not enough pool chairs and people start pushing as well as running and jumping over the sunbeds.”
The Englishwoman, who came to the hotel with her partner and children for the first time, said she did not enjoy the experience and ‘will not come back.’
A Scottish family staying at the resort had a similar experience: “My daughter was first in the queue but grown men started jumping over the fence, behaving as if they were kids,” a Glaswegian grandma told the Olive Press.
“Some people wear trainers so they can run faster,” her husband explained.
Irishman Michael Fitzpatrick, from County Laois, defines the morning battles as a ‘mad rush.’
“It is dangerous because the pool surface is very slippery,” the 47-year-old said.
But it is not just Brits and Irish that are affected by the issue, as some Spanish holidaymakers are seeing their favourite hotel turning into a battlefield.
“We have been coming to this hotel for over 20 years and we had never seen anything like this before. We don’t go to the pool anymore, it is just unbearable as they’re adults behaving like kids,” Victoria and Enrique, a married couple from Cordoba in their sixties, told the Olive Press.
The couple explain that there are around 150 people gathering around the fence before 9am and refers to the pool fanatics as ‘slaves of the sunbeds’
And Miguel, a 73-year-old Spaniard who has been coming to the resort for almost two decades, explains that ‘it is the first year you see this madness of over 100 people running like crazy to get hold of their wanted spot.’
A number of guests have told the Olive Press that some early birds start queuing before 7am, two hours before the pool opens.
And it seems like many sunbathers, after securing their place, leave their towel on the sunbed and then just take off, leaving the chair unoccupied for hours.
However, not everyone seems bothered by the situation as Belfast man Kev Armstrong believes the morning hunt ‘is part of the holiday experience.’
“We just start queuing at 7.45am, it’s not too bad,” said Armstrong, who is staying at the hotel for a week with his wife Jaqueline.
Anderson’s sentiments are shared by Matt Lanigan, from Ireland: “It’s alright, no need to panic, there are enough sunbeds for everyone,” he calmly said.
The Olive Press has contacted the director of the Sunset Beach Club, who argues the situation is fully under control.
“There are no fights, so what it has been pictured on British TV, is not accurate. Currently, during the high season, there are around 1,900 guests in the hotel, so the fact that there is a queue of 20 people waiting to enter the pool is nothing crazy,” Miguel Marcos, Sunset Beach Club Director, told the Olive Press.
Marcos added: “People do not jump over the fence but, if someone wants to start running to get to the sunbed they want, what can we do? We cannot do anything, they are not doing anything illegal, we are not police officers, we cannot forbid people to run. But there is not an avalanche of people running because there are 700 sunbeds.”
The Director further revealed that they have not hired additional security: “We have a security guard 24 hours, 365 days a year. The pool has three accesses that are opened by the two lifeguards and the security officer, who comes down to help. We have not hired a bouncer, as the British media claims, he is a security officer that has been trained to give great customer service and who has saved lives because he knows how to use the defibrillator. This person that has been captured in the images is a hero in the hotel as he has saved a number of lives, so comparing it to a nightclub bouncer is not correct. We have not had to hire additional security.”
Read more:
- SUNBED WARS: Hot-heads on Costa del Sol
- Three Irish tourists arrested at airport trying to flee Spain’s Mallorca after torching sunbeds
- Beach hoggers planting early morning umbrellas face fines on Spain’s Costa Blanca
