BOURNEMOUTH was the hottest place in the UK yesterday as temperatures hit 31C.

On Saturday, the mercury hit 28.6C at noon as more than 120,000 sun seekers hit the town. Car parks filled up early on Saturday with Sandbanks car park closed by lunchtime.

By noon temperatures had hit 28C and there was barely space to stretch out on the sands near Bournemouth Pier.

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Hoteliers and guesthouse owners were cashing in on the second weekend of sweltering sunshine with little last-minute accommodation available.

A spokesman for Bournemouth Tourism said: “It’s been another fantastic weekend.

“There have been around 120,000 people with the maximum on the beach 100,000 and the rest in the gardens and elsewhere.

“We’ve never really known it like this for this time in July. “It can get this busy in the school summer holidays but this is unprecedented. The industry is pretty chuffed; hotels are doing pretty well.”

But litter once again proved a major problem across Bournemouth beach leaving council workers to clear up piles of rubbish, cans and cardboard.

Saturday night saw huge amounts of rubbish dumped on the sands around the pier and along the streets near the BIC.

Bottles, cans, cardboard boxes, towels, takeaway containers, and even shoes, clothes and inflatable water toys were left behind, as people left the shore.

One Bournemouth beach-comber, who has been trawling the local shores for 22 years, said he thought it was horrendous.

 

Despite large seafront bins not all being full, people still left litter on the beach. Staff out yesterday eve and today cleaning up

— Bournemouth Council (@bournemouthbc) July 15, 2013

“It’s really bad today,” said the man, who didn’t want to be named. “Over the years it has got better but it’s awful tonight. There’ve been so many people here.

“Some people do pick it up but obviously others leave it for the council to do. It looks horrible.”

A spokesman for Bournemouth Tourism said teams had been out through the night to clear the beach of litter.

“We’re just trying to encourage people to dispose of their rubbish responsibly.

“We need to get that message across and hopefully as the summer goes on, people will get better.”

Large blue bins on Bournemouth seafront were not full by 8pm at night although smaller litter bins were overflowing.

The situation follows a similar problem last weekend when two small mechanical road sweepers broke down, causing delays to the clean-up operation.

Yesterday evening, traffic was again slow on the A338 Spur Road out of Bournemouth and the A31 eastbound from Ashley Heath.

Queues started building from around 5pm on both roads with vehicles crawling along the dual carriageways until later in the evening.

And although traffic was heavy the congestion was not on the same levels as last weekend.