Fancy swapping that trip to Majorca for Motherwell?
In search of some summer holiday inspo? It might not be the Balearic Islands but Motherwell has made it to the top ten new UK staycation spots. The Safecation report, conducted by money.co.uk, ranked the top places in the country based on factors such as free activities, space, safety, park entry fee, dog friendliness, visitors per year and number of caravan parks/camping sites within a 50km radius.
It also took a list of the UK locations that are home to the largest public parks (according to Ordnance Survey) and compared them against the UK’s most-visited staycation destinations to reveal the safest staycations.
With Strathclyde Country Park on its doorstep, the North Lanarkshire town found itself in sixth place as the next best staycation spot for social distancing. First and second place went to The Gower in Wales and Keswick in Cumbria mainly due to the number of campsites, parks, beaches, free activities and contactless services.
However, Motherwell wasn’t the only new staycation spot in Scotland that featured in the list. Kilwinning in Ayrshire (which got third place), Paisley in Renfrewshire, Dunbar in East Lothian and Isle of Harris in the Outer Hebrides made the top 25 list for the best new UK staycation destinations for social distancing.
Plus, all of these Scottish areas made the top five for safety based on the crime rate recorded in December 2020. Motherwell, in particular, also scored highly as a budget-friendly staycation spot due to no parking charges and park admission fees as well as offering a number of free activities.
Unfortunately for Glasgow, it was ranked 14th for the worst staycation destinations for social distancing, but just a bit better than Edinburgh who was ranked the 13th worst. But, it was Inverness in the Highlands which had the worst score out of all the Scottish destinations analysed in the report. The list saw traditional UK holiday destinations such as Devon and Windermere in the Lake District scoring highly as a hotspot for over-crowding.
So, who’s reconsidering their summer holiday destination now?
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