Holiday destinations that were unexpectedly lovely OR awful.

[NickiFury]

Torremolinos - ex booked it and I really didn't want to go. It was beautiful, amazing food, beach, perfect for kids, been back loads since.

Thailand - I hated it from the moment I left Bangkok airport, Krabi down by the coast was ok but the rest of the time was awful, I actually cried with relief when we touched down at Heathrow.

[reallyanotherone]

Australia- hated it.

Bangkok i loved, but had friends out there do got the local experience, hugely different from being a tourist.

[BillSykesDog]

Sidari in Corfu was horrendous. We went on the recommendation of a friend who'd been about 10 years before and said it was a nice small resort. Had been quite developed since then and just marketed at the most horrendous vile, rough people. And that isn't snobbyness, I don't mind a bucket and spade resort, this was at a level where the locals were telling us that the tourists averaged one or two arson attacks a week and stabbings and domestic violence were common. They also treated the locals like shit and expected them basically to their personal slaves, clicking fingers at them and ordering them around.

[AnyFucker]

Bali.... a complete shit hole

Ibiza.....I have been about 10 times now and I love the place

[islandtiare]

Montesquieu des Alberes, south of France

We had booked an absolutely amazing looking villa, cos 3 grand for the week (were sharing with friends) ...looked forward to it for months. It sounded and looked amazing

But the villa was filthy just absolutely filthy. and the air con was broken and the owners were in England and didn't give a fuck anyway. And There was ants everywhere and mosquitoes, I got bitten to fuck

It was 36-38 degrees even in the middle of the night

There was sod all to do absolutely sod all. And we didn't even go to the beach cos was too hot

[AnyFucker]

Torremolinos... I enjoyed it. Had a lovely holiday (pre kids) at a hotel right on the beach. We would sunbathe for a couple of hours in the morning then have a long, sangria filled lunch at one of the beach bars. Then back onto the beach about 4pm to sleep off the sangria. Happy memories.

[NicknameUsed]

Our coach did a drop off in Sidari last time we went to Corfu and I was pleased we weren't staying there.

We stayed in Arillas which was lovely.

When we went to Crete the village we stayed in was only a few miles along the coast from Malia and we were a bit concerned, but it was low key and quiet, and the hotel was fabulous.

[mrsclooneytoyou]

Kefalonia absolutely beautiful
Barcelona absolutely hated it. Could not walk 2 steps without being harassed by beggars

[AnyFucker]

Oh I loved Barcelona !

Dublin....dull as fuck

[bigkidsdidit]

I didn't like Australia at all either. I'm always baffled by people who love it so much they want to emigrate.

[NicknameUsed]

We were underwhelmed by Bali as well. It wasn't awful, but it is heavily populated and the roads have a lot of ribbon development. Also, being pestered by hawkers all the time was very irritating.

The holiday was redeemed by a mini cruise that included a visit to Komodo which was amazing.

[WipsGlitter]

I loved LasVegas. Was only there fur a few days but it was great!

Can't think of anywhere that turned out shit!

[OhtoblazeswithElvira]

Copenhagen - awful.

Scary bottleneck at the arrivals exit at the airport. It took us literally an hour to walk about 10 metres. It got so hot I thought I would faint.

Had to wait almost an hour (tickets expire after an hour) for trains that were supposed to come every 5 mins. Station filled with smoke, smoking was allowed.

Foreign credit or debit cards were not accepted.

The heavily advertised bike hire point wasn't actually available until weeks later - some mix up with the dates apparently In the cycling capital of the world we were unable to hire a bike because bike hire places close on a Saturday at midday.

In fact everything closes at Saturday at midday INCLUDING THE CENTRAL TOURIST OFFICE. Everyone goes off and they don't go back to work until Monday afternoon. So it's not a great weekend destination.

People drinking from the morning so by midday the town had groups of half naked drunken young men yelling.

Huge sex shop adverts all over the place (buses, banners on the street).

Rough town centre in general, saw police chases and people smoking crack at midday sitting on their doorsteps, quite openly. Have not seen this anywhere else, I come from a pretty rough background.

Not impressed! People were beautifully welcoming and polite but I won't come back in a hurry.

[chocolatejunkie1]

I am so glad you said Torremolinos, I'm going there on holiday this year!
Went to Florida, did tourist things as well as local and loved it,

[OhTheRoses]

Santorini - awful place full of black gritty sand, donkey shit and steep hills.

St Stephano in Corfu. Always thought Corfu was naff and some of it is.

Two weeks in Fowey as a cancellation - divine.

The Languedoc. I thought it would be dull. It's divine.

[UnikittyInHerBusinessSuit]

I was hugely disappointed by Florence. A city completely overwhelmed by tourism and devoid of actual life of its own. And because it's in a bit of a natural bowl and the streets are full of badly tuned Vespas, the air is pretty much unbreathable (this was a while ago, they may have improved it). However I grant you that I'm biassed by the fact that I was 5 months pg so a full-on sightseeing and walking city break was perhaps a bit over-optimistic and left me knackered.

[user7755]

Thought I'd hate Orlando, love it (you do have to suspend your cynicism though)

[TheWitTank]

Dominican Republic -couldn't wait to go home. Had to stay on the resort as it wasn't safe to venture out. If you wanted to walk on the beach at night/evening the arned guard accompanied you . Got a dicky tummy from the food, pestered by people selling stuff ALL DAY every day, including travel reps trying to sell excursions. They were persistent to the point of aggression. Was boring. Spent a lot of time watching films in our room.
Best has been Florida. Such good fun. Holland was beautiful too.

[UnikittyInHerBusinessSuit]

Oh and Cannes, which I went to for a work do and was really excited about. Hugely disappointing. It's the fact that the whole beach is divided into tiny segments belonging to each hotel that annoyed me most.

[chicaguapa]

I loved Malaga. I'd always thought of it as just being the gateway to the Costa del Hell Sol, but stopped there on a cruise. Absolutely loved the city. It had an amazing feel and reminded us of Barcelona. We went back the following year for a holiday.

I don't get Mallorca. Everyone raves about it but I've been twice and just don't see it. There are some beautiful places on the island but I just can't pick up the vibe.

[bigkidsdidit]

I went to st Petersburg once for a conference and tagged a few days' holiday onto the end. I was on my own. Everyone consequently thought I was a prostitute and the hotel shamelessly tried to rip me off (eg the receptionist trying to charge me £50 to use the hotel gym open to all guests).

I booked a taxi to the centre through he hotel and the driver locked the door and made me give him all my money.

I came home early

[NickiFury]

It is great chocolate. Are you hiring a car? You really don't need to though. There is a bus that runs up and down the coast every ten minutes, one way to Malaga or the other way to Benalmadena and then on to Fuengirola. All worth a visit, especially the harbour at Benalmadena and also into the old town in Benalmadena or Fuengirola. Marbella is further up the coast as well but honestly we only ever went there once, its so nice just where you are.

[TheWitTank]

Oh, and Disney Paris was fun, but hated the rudeness of other people visiting the park -shoving to get on rides and buses, pushing children out of the way to watch fireworks, open smoking in lines for rides and round the park (I got burnt twice!).

[lurkingfromhome]

Expected to hate Las Vegas but had the best fun there. Was surprised by how many fabulous restaurants there were and the quality of the hotel. Wouldn't stay for a fortnight but for four or five days it's fantastic.

Cannot bear Dublin. Expected to love it, found it a ridiculously expensive dump full of drunken stag parties and with nothing I actually wanted to do. Sorry Dubliners.

[NickiFury]

I loved Orlando too. A relative and I took my children there to do the Disney thing and I was looking forward to it but kind of thinking I would endure Disney and the other theme parks rather than enjoy them. I absolutely loved every minute of it.

[Destinysdaughter]

Loved Koh Phangan in Thailand. Beautiful island, golden sandy beaches, delicious and cheap food and calm friendly pp. Was in July so not v many tourists.

Sicily. Can't remember name of town but it was awful. Went with a large group. The house looked like it was a secluded villa but was on a new build estate. Beaches were dirty brown sand. Nothing to do locally. Went into the town one evening ( was in May ). Nothing was open except a horrid pizza takeaway place. The islands were quite nice as was Taomina but our shitty little town was crap. The only holiday where I was glad to get back to work!