Tourists asked to visit resort for 'right reasons'

There are calls for tourists visiting a coastal village to do so for the "right reasons" and respect locals dealing with the effects of erosion over the winter.

Thorpeness in Suffolk has seen 11 homes demolished before they fell in to the sea, after bad weather eroded away large sections of the cliffs.

Shelley Cowlin, whose home of 48 years was torn down, said tourists turning up to witness other people's suffering were "sick".

Hamish Ogilvie, who owns the Thorpeness Meare boating lake, said: "It's obviously very sad to come just because some people's houses have fallen into sea and I think we need to be very respectful of them."

Ogilvie is the great-great grandson of playwright and barrister Glencairn Stuart Ogilvie, who developed Thorpeness from a small fishing hamlet in the 19th Century into a seaside resort.

The boating lake has more than 100 boats, some of which were originally used as fishing vessels at sea, according to Ogilvie.

He said Thorpeness was a great place for young people to "have their own adventures, as they did 50, 100, years ago".

After a difficult winter for many in the village, Ogilvie said people should be visiting to enjoy the sights and not just to see the destruction.

"I think it's sad to come to such a nice place for those reasons, when there are much better reasons to come here," he said.

Now living in a holiday let, which Cowlin said did not feel "like home", the 89-year-old called on so-called "trauma tourists" to leave villagers in peace.

"We don't want people relishing in glee at the tragedy of other people," she said.

Cowlin said there had been incidents of people claiming they were her gardener, or even her grandchildren, and stealing things.

"We had one fellow deciding to remove my ornamental flower pots and then another guy decided he was my so-called gardener and he was not. I have a very nice gardener and it was not him," she said.

"I don't understand the mentality. I really do feel they must be a bit peculiar.

"Why do you want to take photographs of houses that have been demolished? It's just not on."

David Scott is chief executive of The Hotel Folk Group, which owns Thorpeness Golf Club and Hotel.

He said the early signs of tourists wanting to visit the village were positive.

"What we've seen with our upcoming bookings in April and May is probably the strongest couple of months since the Covid lockdown," he said.

Scott said tourism was "vitally important" to the area and Thorpeness was becoming "stronger as a tourist destination as people find it".

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