What famous places have disappointed you?

[mouldyhousemouldylife]

Or a landmark, artwork etc.

I guess mine is Plitvice Lakes in Croatia and Lake Bled in Slovenia. I've wanted to go for years as they both looked unbelievable and magical on photos, but going there just felt pretty ordinary. Very nice looking but I wasn't blown away.

Anyone else been to either? What did you think?

Lake Bled - looks ordinary when standing next to it, but we enjoyed hill climb and view at top. We had fun rowing boat around too, made day more fun. It isn't exactly exotic wilderness. You get more of it in Romania.

I surprisingly loved Rome - it was much better than expectation. I am reasonably well travelled, so probably mentally filed Rome at bottom of bucket list as too touristy and overrated. London and Paris for me are big complicated cities with a few nice bits. Vibrant, interesting but certainly not pretty at all. I live in London but I am ashamed of Southbank and Leicester square which is where tourists go, urgh.

I thought Rome would be like that - small centre, but rough everywhere else...but turns out it was just freaking pretty everywhere, need minimum 5 full days to savour most of it. Who needs to go to Colisseum when you can enjoy view of entire Roma Forum and ancient Rome landscape from top of Palatine Hill! You don't need to go into Trevi Fountain though - if it was more empty it would have looked really impressive at night, but unfortunately let down by too many people you can't see water. Eww. Not all Rome is that overcrowded though. I had entire Maria di Maggiore to myself at 7:30am in morning, it was a dream.

Vatican is sensory overload of how disgustingly rich the Catholics were - so people probably are shattered by time they get to Sistine at the end of Vatican tour. I loved geography chamber, OMG :))) I loved Sistine Chapel, it was nothing like other chapels - I was shocked at amount of nudity and depravity for a church, I also knew Micheloangelo and Botticelli well so it was thrill to see them :) YANBU though at Vatican not being comfortable and overcrowded.

First time I saw New York in December - I wandered around with mouth wide open, even though cafes and food were big letdown. Second time was with kids and in summer - just nasty dirty concrete jungle utterly lacking green spaces with Times Square giving you existential nausea about capitalism.

Niagra Falls and San Francisco aren't on my bucket list, but I could be wrong.

I did most of my travelling in the 60's to late 80's. Stopped for a long time, then resumed more recently.
The contrast was unbelievable - in terms of the hordes of tourists, queues, mess, bureaucracy and general unpleasantness.

Yeah it does sum it up. I am lucky my parents took me to many places in 1990s as kid.

Venice - went as a teenager and it was at the time when they had a problem with the water quality. It was dirty and very smelly.

Barcelona and particularly the Sagrada Familia. Really didn't feel comfortable in Barcelona and was so disappointed.

Oh I loved Lake Bled but I did go 30 years ago so perhaps that made a difference. I thought it was one of the most beautiful places I had ever seen. DS is going this summer on my recommendation. I just hope he isn't disappointed!

I was disappointed in both Porto and Rome but the poor weather may have clouded my judgement. Really didn't like Bordeaux, just stank of piss

I've already said a couple of places that I found a bit underwhelming but now I feel bad for saying it, as I've read some other posts where people hate some of my favourite places and it makes me feel weird and sad as if they're my cities and i should protect them 😂

Greyfriars Bobby is just something fun in the middle of lots of other fun places. All the Harry Potter places, the great National Museum, some nice places to eat, the university...

On the Stonehenge subject we stopped there on the way back from Bath. If you don’t do P&R and just walk up you just stand in the other side of a low fence.

They don’t make it easy as no had to screw the info out of one of the Trust guides. It also meant that as we walked back we watched sheep being rounded by a dog and were buzzed by a Chinook (is that right?) on training with waving army types hanging out, the kids loved it.

Times Square is the emperor's new clothes of tourism. There's nothing to see yet it's packed with people looking at ... well... nothing

I love Rome and Barcelona and thought Pompeii was fantastic. I was disappointed by the Sistine Chapel but the Vatican and St Peters were amazing. Going to Prague this summer for the first time in 15 years. I am interested to see how it has changed. Ditto Budapest - last visit was 25 years ago. I expect both to be much more touristy.

Bali - weather was bad, dangerous to try to cross the road and pestered to buy stuff all the time so couldn't walk along the beach.

Also Bondi beach - uninspiring. Manly was far better.

Loved Venice!

Ditto Bali - long way to fly to swim with dirty disposable nappies.

Bali is a complete shit hole

I think I’m easily pleased. There are lots of places on here that I really enjoyed. We visited Rome and Paris in the autumn rather than high summer, and Venice in November, when it was quiet and magical. Barcelona in February was also good, the highlight was the inside of the Segrada Familia as the sun set, the stained glass windows are amazing and inside the architecture is soaring and magnificent.
It’s a good thing we all like different things, it might not be too crowded the next time I’m in awe at the Grand Canyon since nobody else likes it!

I was rather underwhelmed by Stockholm although the archipelago exceeded my expectations.

Lived in Brussels in the 70s and loved it. Went back 10 years ago for 4 days to find in generally dirty and unkempt. Weeds on the cobbles in front of the palace etc. The Grand Place was still spectacular. However made up for it by the 4 days spent in Ypres with the Menin Gate and the war graves. Reckon older school children should have it as a school trip.

Also lived in Barcelona in the 70s and loved that.. Have recently thought of returning but might be better keeping it as a good memory. Though I would like to visit Montserrat Monastry in the mountains again. But 50 odd years may have spoiled it also with over touristy stuff.

oh yes monte carlo i felt like a pauper

Las vegas slot machine and hotels

What else did you expect

Pisa as so many poor immigrants selling knock off goods and they looked frightened. Lots of men standing around watching their every move and I wondered if they were modern day slaves.
Also tacky stalls on the way on to the walled town area.

Visited Copenhagen in the 80s for 3 weeks staying with family and can't believe folks didn't like it. The Tivoli Gardens were magnificent at night. Perhaps being with family made a big difference as spent a lot of time seeing other parts of Denmark. All beautifully clean but horrendously expensive.

Prague ten years ago was beautiful but give the river tour a miss. Up and down, boring, in sweltering sun with no cover.
Would recommend the trip to the nearby prisoner of war camp Tzarazine. Very humbling.

Amd Cornwall. Some is undeniably quite pretty, ,but a lot of the little fishing villages, I can see much the same, if not nocer, just a quick car ride away from me in Fife.

I saw the Mona Lisa in 2002 & don’t remember it being behind any glass ..must have changed.

It was behind glass in the 1980s.

Capri, I'd wanted to go for a long time, got the very expensive hydrofoil from Sorrento with DC on a boiling hot day. Had an expensive drink in a cafe but DC not wanting to linger. Looked in the designer shops that I couldn't afford to buy in and got the next ferry back.

I was also a bit meh about Berlin but love Paris, New York and Venice although have tended to go out of season. I liked Barcelona 25 years ago but don't think I would go back from what I've heard from othi.

@LadyB49 I agree about Copenhagen and I was mesmerised by Tivoli at night. I went alone, felt like a weirdo in a on the bumper cars by myself but what an experience! Did you go to their upstairs restaurant? It was the first time I'd had a buzzer to collect your order type meal and was very impressed.

Lands End. We went on an overcast day anyway so knew it wouldn’t be what it is on a good day but was shocked to find the place is almost a theme park! And you have to pay to have your photo taken by the sign because the small piece of land on which it sits is private land owned by (I think) a photography company. I believe you can do it free if you go late afternoon but you have to pay a not insignificant amount if you want words of your choice on the sign. There was a Shaun the Sheep attraction and we were handed a voucher book on arrival. I was very shocked by this. £5 for the car park too. I was expecting just the sign and a postbox, silly me. Somewhere with such natural beauty massively spoiled by greed. What a huge disappointment it was.

Bali is a complete shit hole

My friend said the exact same thing about Fiji. He thought it was going to be an island paradise but it was just a bunch of resorts that people never left and outside he was shocked at the poverty.