We asked our readers on Facebook this week which destinations they would like to fly to from Southend Airport.

With 1,700 responses, we had quite a few holiday spots to choose from for this article.

However, we cannot include them all, and therefore these are the most popular replies from our readers.

Alicante, of course, was the winner among the responses with the most pleas for the route to return.

The airport is working tirelessly to get the "obvious win" route back as, pre-pandemic, easyJet ran flights 10 times a week with Ryanair additionally running five weekly flights to Alicante from Southend.

Valerie Pamela Smith wrote: "Been asking for so long to Alicante, we have relations out there and we need to fly from Southend as it’s on our doorstep, and such a brilliant airport to fly to and return home, and many other people would like it as well."

Plenty of commenters also asked for flights to Newquay in Cornwall. 

Colin Grant said: "Newquay in Cornwall. I was on the original maiden flight and it saves hours of travel. Please bring it back."

Murcia in southeastern Spain was another popular holiday location our readers want to jet to from Southend Airport.

Shirley Anne Richardson commented: "Murcia so visiting family [is] a lot easier, always used this route before and [it was] always full."

Other common destinations were Dublin, Belfast, Glasgow, Edinburgh, Malta, the Canary Islands and Italy.

And finally, an honourable mention to Derek Butcher who suggested: "To London in the same time it takes to fly to Spain, the A127 is knackered give us a break."

Bosses at Southend Airport are working hard to secure new routes, alongside its current flights this summer to Faro, Palma de Mallorca, Amsterdam and Malaga.

This week they announced their participation in Routes Europe 2023, which brings together people and businesses with a stake in the future of European air connectivity.

The event will take place at Lodz Airport in Poland, from May 9 to May 11

Nigel Mayes, business development director, said: “We have many meetings booked in with key representatives from airlines and will be meeting more during the event.

“It is a great opportunity to promote our immediately available capacity and low operating costs as part of the 180m London passenger market, the world’s largest aviation market.

“Also not forgetting our proximity to London at only 43 minutes from Stratford, London’s busiest station, and 53 minutes from London Liverpool Street.”