Figuring out your next holiday destination can be quite the challenge, despite being somewhat of a first world problem. Most of us don’t go on a trip fifty times a year and therefore, you simply can’t see everything in the world in your lifetime. And that’s okay. But that also means you have to get your priorities straight when it comes to travelling. Are there any cities, countries or regions that you really want to see at least once in your life? Or are you more about the relaxation part of a vacation, meaning where you go actually matters less to you?
Once you’ve figured that out, there are of course other aspects to keep in mind when making a choice from your travel bucket list. Maybe at this point of your life, budget plays an important role and therefore you prefer going to a less expensive destination. Or maybe, on the contrary, you haven’t got kids yet and you’ve got a great salary so you want to tick off those expensive places first. But budget isn’t everything: there’s also a sustainability issue at stake and that can’t be taken lightly.
Sustainable travel isn’t just about how much energy your hotel consumes or how you get to your destination. How a destination deals with tourism in general is important as well, even though it’s maybe less obvious at first glance. Overtourism is quite the issue at the moment because some cities, some destinations simply drown under the amount of tourists visiting every year. And once the balance between locals and tourists is gone, both visitors and local inhabitants suffer from it. Tourists get a less authentic experience, locals can’t afford anything anymore because prices are based on visitors for the day, the weekend or the week.
But which cities suffer the most? Holidu had a look at the number of yearly tourists per European city and compared that to the inhabitants living there year-round. And in some destinations, the balance has long been gone. The ‘winner’ of the list is Dubrovnik, in Croatia, which welcomes a whopping 36 tourists per inhabitant a year. However, Venice, Bruges and Rhodes don’t do much better and share the second spot with no less than 21 tourists per inhabitant.
