Anti-tourism protests erupt across Spain, Italy and Portugal

Catalonians sprayed holidaymakers with water pistols

Demonstrators are claiming that overwhelming numbers of foreign visitors are driving the natives out of affordable housing whilst increasing the cost of living, with Spain in particular expecting an estimated 100 million tourists in 2025.

The cities of Barcelona, Granada, Palma, Ibiza, Lisbon, Venice, Genova, Palermo, Milan and Naples held fairly peaceful protests, apart from the former, whose Catalonian attendees were urged to spray holidayers with water guns.

Barcelona-based student Carmen Naranjo told Sky News that a great portion of tourists view the city as an "amusement park".

"With the rise of social media and Airbnbs, it seems like we have given up our traditions, festivities, local spots and so on in favour of mass tourism that does not properly engage with Spanish and Catalan culture and our small local businesses," she added.

"People come and see it as an amusement park, to the point where they have had to close some landmarks that locals enjoyed going to because of overcrowding.

"It is not fair for the people of Barcelona to have to endure precarious salaries in hospitality in order to serve mass tourism that stays in these short-term rental apartments, pushing people out of the neighbourhoods we grew up in, as we cannot afford housing anymore."

Also, a man named Txema Escorsa, who lives in a two-bed flat in the residential neighbourhood of Gràcia, shared with the Associated Press that he faces a dilemma as things stand.

"It is tough for me to imagine what to do next. If I leave, will I be contributing to Barcelona losing its essence that comes from its locals? But there comes a time when I'm fed up," he noted.

Jaime Rodriguez de Santiago, the general director of Airbnb in Spain and Portugal, revealed that "a lot of our politicians have found an easy scapegoat to blame for the inefficiencies of their policies in terms of housing and tourism over the last 10, 15, 20 years.

"If you look at the over-tourism problem in Spain, it has been brewing for decades, and probably since the 60s."

As the spectre of climate change keeps growing, perhaps in the not-too-distant future we won't need to flock to these baking-hot countries for some much-needed sunshine.