The first village opened in 1950, in a pine forest bordering a beach in Alcudia, a small fishing village on the island of Palma de Mallorca. In that first year, 2,600 people went. A round trip from Paris cost 16,800 francs, offering 15 days of vacation, 36 hours of train travel and a boat crossing, all without any real comfort.
In 1951, Alcudia couldn't open for the simple reason that the Club was clashing with the Spanish clergy, who weren't entirely comfortable with the sight of young girls in swimsuits. It was a bit of a scandal, at least at the time! So, at the last minute, the club rented a small hotel in Puerto de Alcudia, but the expected success didn't materialize, and relations with the manager were strained. That same year, the village of Golfo di Baratti opened in Tuscany, on a beautiful black volcanic sand beach. Subsequently, villages opened in Corfu (better known as Ipsos), Elba, and Montenegro in Yugoslavia. These first villages were tent villages, with the materials supplied by the Trigano company.
In a text, Jean Pierre BECRET indicated that at the time of the inscriptions, and I quote:
“It was a mad rush! We had to open them first to the old members, then to the new members who were sponsored, then to those who weren’t sponsored… One year, five or six hundred people were queuing on rue de la Bourse when registration opened. The following year, we handed out little numbers. The year after that, we gave out vouchers for a coffee at the bistro next door, which we had specially asked to open, along with these little numbers.”
Videos
Alcudia, the first Club Med village. Short montage with films and images
from Collierbar
