What did you think would be more glamorous or impressive than it was?

[SugarMouseTown]

As a kid I thought that being an actor would be fun and exciting and I'm sure it has its moments but watching the behind the scenes videos much of it looks miserable and dull. Especially action movies where they're required to get drenched with every substance known to man and have explosions and fire going off around them.

What didn't live up to expectations for you?

Oh and I love Paris. We had our honeymoon there 30 years ago and we always stay at the same hotel when we go back.

North Yorkshire. They bang on about "God's own county" but it's a dull old place with not much going on. And the dales aren't a patch on the lakes or the Scottish highlands. Even the Peak District is better.

Marbella

The Caledonian sleeper train

It was very expensive and in the brochure it all looked very luxury. I imagined being gently rocked to sleep in a comfy bed and waking up all refreshed.

In reality it was like the tiniest Travelodge ever. Really noisy, very thin mattress and
duvet, decor very basic and could not sleep a wink as so noisy and uncomfortable.

The buffet car was closed 'due to COVID' so we had to eat pre packed sarnies in our room and the bin was too small to even fit the wrappings in. Breakfast was extra for a very dry bacon roll and an instant coffee.

They sent me a questionnaire afterwards including such choice items as 'how would I rate the presentation of my breakfast?'
I said I didn't really think a brown paper bag counted as presentation.

I thought it would be 'an experience'
Well it was but not one I'd care to ever repeat.

@SirB0bby

Marbella

You expected Marbella to be glamorous? 🤣

Fiji. Dull with nothing of real interest to do & beholden to resorts for activities, food & transport & most are too far from shops. Plus the hotel hired a driver for us & he lied about taking us to the famous lookout, stopping on a trash covered road, insisting that was it. I looked it up later & the real one was glorious.

The Hollywood sign in LA. Small and a bit tatty looking

The Mona Lisa was a big letdown, small and unimpressive

Christmas.
You spend weeks beforehand racing around buying gifts for your all your family, wrapping, food shopping, cooking. Everyone comes over and you spend the whole day hosting which I always find exhausting. Dealing with my poor parents who should have divorced 50 years ago, sniping and having digs at each other - all day. 🙄

The children Iove it though, so I do it for them. I hate Christmas.

Barnard Castle

@Skinnyankles

Christmas. You spend weeks beforehand racing around buying gifts for your all your family, wrapping, food shopping, cooking. Everyone comes over and you spend the whole day hosting which I always find exhausting. Dealing with my poor parents who should have divorced 50 years ago, sniping and having digs at each other - all day. 🙄

The children Iove it though, so I do it for them. I hate Christmas.

Share the load 👍

Career. Lots of backstabbing, high school style bullying by exclusion, paperwork, pointless meetings, mysoginy & expectation to work long hours if you want a promotion or not be called lazy. Benched when you come back from mat leave.

Will be looking for a job again shortly. I'll be looking for hours & $, not a high position.

@FKATondelayo

I mean did anyone really think in lockdown - wow I can't wait for this to be over so I can pay £££ to go into a darkened room and look at a picture of some dead bloke I've never heard of.

I have to agree with this!

Pre-pandemic, I went to galleries and exhibitions on a weekly basis. Since everything re-opened, not so much. I went to the RA a month or so ago to see Hockney. Utter crap and so so crowded. Haven't stepped foot in another gallery or museum since!

@FKATondelayo

But if you don’t like art, and/or are wrangling small children who don’t, surely that’s down to you? I mean, if you’re not interested in looking at old paintings, why go to an art gallery? I love the Uffizi and have gone several times, but would never go to a theme park because that would be pure hell for me.

I do like art though (ex history of art student, work in a creative profession) - that's why I went to the Uffizi. It just made me realise that I like specific exhibitions curated by artist or period or theme rather than acre after acre of collections. And taking my kids made me see it through their eyes - it's a dry and dull way to display art and most of the people there are not that interested in it. They are just ticking a box on a cruise ship tour.

I'm the same with museums. All the big 'must do' museums are boring and complicated. Best museum I've ever been to is the Leprosy Museum in Bergen - small and perfect.

But you’re clearly someone who should restrict yourself to smaller themed exhibitions, rather than claiming that there’s something wrong with the Uffizi because you dislike the way it displays its collections, or the other people looking at them. I do agree, though, that it’s ridiculous to treat art museums as some kind of tourist ‘must see’ — unless someone actually likes looking at paintings/sculpture, there’s really no point in walking through acres of galleries, bored to death, just because the Rough Guide told you it was ‘unmissable’, any more than you’d do something else you know you have zero interest in while on holiday.

Poor Niagra falls, it’s absolutely breathtaking and if you have a few days in the area there’s lots of interesting places.

The Canadian side is a full on tourist trap of tacky attractions, we found the best thing is just to fully embrace the cheese and go total tourist mode. Our first time arriving was an eye opener to be sure.

We were underwhelmed by Venice, I do want to go again though to give it a second chance, on the last day or so we found more off the beaten path things to explore.

@CarbonMonoxideParty

Barnard Castle

Surely not? Are you sure your glasses don't need changing?

@JurassickJay

Manchester.

It's not unlike Croydon. Only smaller.

Manchester is not smaller than Croydon! 😂

Lol

I'm going to see Petra in Jordan in a couple of years

It’s amazing - I went in October when it was much cooler and it was virtually empty. Stay at the cave hotel right next door.

• no frills but very convenient.

@notacooldad

I was so disappointed with Tonys chocolonely. I read on MN about how fabulous it was and found that it really wasn't. You cant even break it off into even squares!

It's not supposed to be broken into even squares. That's fairly evident from the design.

Hollywood.

Very crowded, dirty and feels a bit shifty.

@FKATondelayo

I didn't mind the Vatican but the Uffizi in Florence is a load of shite.

Art galleries generally, especially with children. I'm starting to think paying £20 a head to look at some boring old pictures is the biggest confidence trick / fraud of our time.

Well, I guess you're just not into art (or 'old' art anyway). It's only a confidence trick in the same way as getting people to pay for theme parks is a confidence trick: if you like it you like it, if you don't you don't. Although I do think if you think art is all 'boring old pictures' you could perhaps open your mind and apply a bit of thought to what you're looking at/read up a bit.

Things I always imagined were glamorous but really really aren't:

• Business travel. All of it. It's fucking terrible. Most of the time you are alone so it's tedious and even though it's a 5 star hotel the restaurant is too 'posh' to eat alone so you end up eating McDonalds on the bed
• Airline First Class
• Airline Business Class
• Airline First Class or Business Class lounges
• Hotels like the Dorchester, Claridges etc. Mayfair cocktails bars etc, they are mainly full of people who have gone there to experience the glamour but those days are long gone due to the huge amount of people who come to experience the glamour
• Private members clubs. Worlds dullest places.
• Hotel restaurants. All of them are dreadful and usually half empty with the reminders of that mornings breakfast buffet lurking in a corner.
• 'Secret' bars. Usually involves queuing for an hour round the back of an office block near the bins and entering a loud basement populated by hens parties and having to shout at your companion while being elbowed by a pissed up bloke...rather than the idea of wafting into a dimly lit speakeasy that plays dinner jazz and being brought a cocktail to your table by a spatz wearing waiter
• Boat parties. Trapped for the duration

Oh god forgot about Casinos

One expects it to be like a James Bond film with sparkly frocks and black tie

It's 70% people who have probably not been home in 6 days looking haunted and ill around poker tables. 10% oligarchs. 10% weirdos. 5% stag nights and 5% tourists. They always feel stagnant and oppressive as none of them have windows to outside.

And yes to cruises. They seem the epitome of glamour but they are, as a PP said, a floating Weatherspoon

@NFLBingo

Football matches in the boxes - Gah it’s so boring even with bubbly London - Full of rude people who are always in a rush, the tube smells like piss and sweat, there are hundreds of tacky stalls everywhere selling tat, it’s is SO expensive then the restaurants all seem to add on an ‘options’ service charge too, regardless of party size then look at you like the wanker for saying you will tip at your discretion?! I’ve been to 6 of them this past week and all of them tried to add on 12.5% for blanking the two of us for most of the meal. Er, no. The London Eye is boring, it’s only useful feature is the fireworks display it has on NYE. Manchester CC - Full of homeless people on spice and on a Friday/Saturday night legless people wobbling around like baby giraffes. Clubbing - Expensive, repetitive, boring, full of dickheads Staying at Hilton hotels - Stayed in a few of the bigger more expensive ones and just could t see what the fuss was about. LV bags - They’re not worth the hype and I never use mine, I always think I should sell it but can never be bothered with the faff. Jo Malone candles/diffusers etc - they all smell cheap and vile. Champagne - I think I’ve found one I can drink without gagging and that’s just a bog standard £30ish lanson. Caviar - Tried it once at Harrods thinking myself all posh, bloody awful stuff! The Caribbean - Been twice, thought it was just horribly humid and the places I went lacked the freedom to do much without a tour guide.

I’m not a miserable cow IRL honest

You probably need to plan your trips better. You seem to hate everything. Common denominator and all that...

Land's End.

Just nothing really. You're not even sure where the actual Land's End is with people roaming about over the dull unimpressive coastline. Plus an over commercialised retail area selling underwhelming Cornish pasties for a tenner, various bits of tourist tat and penny arcades.

Lizard Point (the UK's most southerly point) on the other hand, was beautiful and far less commercialised.

Completely agree with Lands End. Tourism at its absolute worst.

Was really saddened by going there.