Gemma Atkinson Recalls Mortifying Holiday Incident with Gorka Marquez
Gemma Atkinson has opened up about a deeply embarrassing moment she experienced during a holiday with her partner, Gorka Marquez, shortly after they first met on BBC One's Strictly Come Dancing. The actress and presenter, now 41, described feeling "mortified" when paparazzi captured a private prank on a beach in Tenerife, an incident that was exposed after an airline leaked their travel plans.
Strictly Come Dancing Romance and Early Days
Gemma Atkinson and Gorka Marquez first crossed paths in 2017 while both were involved in Strictly Come Dancing. At the time, Gemma was partnered with professional dancer Aljaž Škorjanec, finishing as one of the runners-up in the series. Meanwhile, Gorka was paired with former X Factor winner Alexandra Burke, and he also reached the final of the competition.
Despite not being dance partners, their relationship blossomed off the dance floor. A year later, the couple confirmed they were in a romantic relationship, and they announced their engagement on Valentine's Day in 2021. Today, they share two children together, Mia and Thiago, building a family life away from the spotlight.
The Mortifying Tenerife Trip
During the early stages of their relationship, Gemma and Gorka took a trip to Tenerife in the Canary Islands, where they were photographed spending time together on a beach. Reflecting on this first holiday together on their Lost in Translation podcast, Gemma said, "That's the one of us where those horrible pap pictures came out and I was mortified. It was Tenerife, wasn't it, straight after the tour we went. Those awful pictures came out of us on the beach."
Gorka responded by downplaying the incident, stating, "It wasn't awful, we were just playing on the beach, it was the last day, and it was like a quiet beach." He added that they had ordered food and were sitting between two sunbeds when Gemma asked him to apply suncream for her.
The Suncream Prank and Paparazzi Capture
Instead of helping her apply the suncream, Gorka decided to play a joke. He explained, "I was making a joke, instead of doing the suncream I squeezed the bottle of suncream all over her, so it was on her face. At the same time, 500m away in the cliffs was this random paparazzi deciding to take pictures."
Gemma described the photographer as "alright" and revealed that he "grassed up" the source who tipped off the paparazzi about their location. She said, "That pap, he was alright, and we asked him, I was like, 'Genuinely, we booked this so privately, who did you find out we were coming here?' But he told us that the airline we booked with told the agency what flight we were on."
The airline had disclosed their flight details to a media agency, enabling paparazzi to trail them from the airport to their hotel. Gemma noted, "They got on the same flight and trailed us from the airport to the hotel, so he said, 'I knew you were at that hotel'. It was fine, because he had a job to do, but since then we have always booked in a different way."
Reflections on the Incident
Gemma went on to comment that Gorka, now 35, "was young" during their trip to Tenerife. She added, "He was pretending to wipe semen on my face in the form of suncream and that's the pap shot. So yeah, he was young. Crikey, and people were like, 'Oh my god, you're disgusting, you so obviously set that up.' No, I didn't, I would have set one up breathing in, on all fours."
This candid revelation highlights the challenges celebrities face in maintaining privacy, even during intimate moments. The incident has led Gemma and Gorka to adopt more discreet travel booking methods to avoid similar exposures in the future.
