Best and worst place you have been on holiday to?!

[Frosty66611]

My best was definitely Canada. Driving through the Rockies was an unforgettable experience and we got perfect weather and lots of lovely food and hotel stops along the way.

The worst has to be Dublin. I was really underwhelmed by it and found it crazy expensive.

Not RTFT yet but :

Best : New Zealand

Worst : Haven, Lake District (shithole)
Disneyland Paris (crap)

Best: hands down Maldives. Returned from first trip just days ago and can't pull myself out of the comedown. The scenery was just so beautiful, spent almost a whole week gazing at it and snorkelling amongst the most incredible fish. The people, the food, it was perfection and the benchmark for all future holidays. Before that I absolutely loved Barbados. Didn't stay in a resort but in a friends condo in a residential area by the sea. Loved just hanging out at the local rum shacks and hired a car to explore the island. Swam with turtles. It was fab. Also loved Iceland, again, I was mind blown by the scenery. There's also a piece of my heart firmly lodged in Andalucia. I have been nearly every year to the Granada area for the last 20 years and I don't care what happens with Brexit, I'm going to invest in property there, not for profit but just so I have a proper base there.

Worst holiday was Menorca. Just not the Spain I love (although I do have a huge soft spot for Majorca) and was on holiday with ill kids and uptight family

Best- Singapore, Bali, Kerala, seaside town near Barcelona, Rome , Berlin, Dorset and Cornwall.

Worse- chalet in West Wales that belonged to a friend of my parents. Previous people left shit all over the toilet and bathroom (obviously unwell) and we had to clean it up. Sort of out us off for the rest of the week!

Gran Canairia as a teen- it was a complete dump but served a purpose as a boozy teen.

Marrakech with a friend - down to spectacularly bad planning. It was unusually cold and we didn’t have enough warm clothing. We would have to go out in the evening wearing lots of layers. I ended up being pregnant so some things we’d planned weren’t suitable (baths and clambering up mountains). We’d opted to stay in a traditional riad which was lovely but had no TV and we only had a novel and a guidebook between us. We were quite bored in the evenings and ended up going to bed at about 8.30! Got sick of being harassed too. Taxi ride back to the airport in the rain was an experience. No seat belts. Rain. No windscreen wipers. Man trying to clear windscreen with a news paper. Me clutching my tummy and hoping for the best.

I’m disappointed to hear about Bali. It was nearly 15 years ago that we went to Ubud and we loved it and dream of going back.

Best Madeira or Niagara Falls.
Worst by a million miles is Benidorm, awful awful place !

Best was British Columbia. Worst was Camber Sands. It looked lovely, long sandy beach for the kids, but the people were awful, shouting and swearing and the accommodation was filthy.

Frosty we also got salmonella food poisoning in Benidorm so that didn't help.If i won a holiday there I would seriously give it away.

@clarich007 me too! I’ve never been so unwell in my whole life. Our hotel room had cockroaches too

It still makes me shudder to think about it now..Our so called hotel overlooked a building site, a car park, and a night club.Horrible hotel, food appalling.But to be fair, away from Benidorm we quite enjoyed the trips.

Best was Krabi and Chiangmai in Thailand. Also really enjoyed Barbados out of all the Caribbean islands I’ve visited. Have a soft spot for Venice.

Worst was Cabo in Mexico.

We had initially been looking at Antigua and Dominican Republic but all the best hotels had dodgy reviews regarding the food.

Antigua is beautiful and we ate really well there. Stayed at Halcyon Cove. It's such a long time since I went though, that I couldn't comment on the food or the hotel now.

Dominican Republic I've yet to hear anything positive about. It seems to consist of downmarket AI hotels where people are told to stay in resort for their own safety.

Jamaica may look beautiful but I don't hear many encouraging things about it.

How about Costa Rica?

Someone upthread mentioned Krabi, Thailand. We ABSOLUTELY adored it. It's just the most beautiful place - so long as you are looking outwards to the beaches, islands and the sea. We were staying in a gorgeous hotel quite a way outside of the town centre. One day we decided to get a taxi into Ao Nang - God, what a hovel. Brash, loud, cheap and nasty. Just roads and roads of identical shops selling tourist tat and cheap noodle bars and happy hour bars full of backpackers and dodgy looking tourists that looked like the sort of people we try avoid at home.

The beach was lovely but there was a huge concrete wall behind it separating it from a really busy main road with trucks spewing diesel fumes everywhere. We couldn't find a single decent looking restaurant so we got in a taxi and went back to the hotel. It took us longer in the car there and back than we spent in the town!

Having said all that, I'd go back to Krabi (and Thailand in general) in a heartbeat. But you do need to pick your area carefully, and if you are on a tight budget you do need to expect it to be a bit rough around the edges.

I'd say all things considered Thailand is probably my all-round most favourite holiday destination. It's so diverse, there is something for everyone and if you move around a bit you can have three holidays in one. It's culturally fascinating, SO beautiful, beaches are out of this world, the people are gentle and friendly, it's really good value for money.

Plus you can have a beach massage every day for about six quid a time. What's not to like?

Clarich and Frosty I got food poisoning on my one and only holiday to a Spanish costa as well! It was the absolute worst. All the places I've been in Asia and never had a problem, eaten street food in Thailand, Vietnam, Sri Lanka, Malaysia and yet it was a nice restaurant in Spain that nearly finished me off!

Best- Italy
Worst - Tenerife

St Lucia , really didn’t enjoy it. Didn’t feel safe. We were staying in a small hotel that was wonderful. But even though we hired a car to tr6 and get round just always felt a bit edgy.

Kitts and Nevis, amazing experience, so friendly and beautiful.

I passed through Benidorm during the course of a holiday once. It looked like a hellhole.

@kirstyallsoppsfattertwin (great name haha) I did look at costa Rica and found a fabulous hotel with great reviews etc. We are only able to go away for a week though and it’s quite a long journey (although I suppose it’s not going to be much further than the Caribbean).
Going to Thailand next year as have family there.
I’ll check out the hotel you mentioned in Antigua

Went to St Lucia many years ago.
I thought it was Stunning BUT a desperately poor place, very difficulty to wander around independently without feeling threatened.

Total opposite of Barbados which was geographically very boring but felt safe.

Not sure about worst but I thought Vienna was unimaginably dull. Sharm el Sheik wasn't nice at all but the hotel was fine and the snorkelling made up for it.

Best holiday by a country mile our honeymoon which was safari in Kenya followed by week in Zanzibar.

@clionba I had been to Malta a few years ago with friends and quite enjoyed it. Based on that DP and I decided to go for a short break...pertinent point here is that DP is Black. We’re widely travelled, including Central & Eastern Europe, but have never experienced such overt racism as we experienced in Malta.

We even got another instance at the airport just travelling home from a cruise. I’m afraid Malta will not be getting any more of my money.

"but I thought Vienna was unimaginably dull"

Vienna is so rich in art and culture. It is compact and has many beautiful buildings. I'm staggered that you found it dul. although I did find the Spanish Riding School dull as I have no interest in horses.

The Kunsthistorisches Museum is amazing. The cathedral, the coffee houses, Sacher Hotel, Hundertwasser House, Schonnbrun Palace, Prater Amusement Park, and many other sites are enough to fill several days. Unless you are a completely cultural philistine I fail to see why you found it so boring.

Thank you, @EstuaryBird. That's very pertinent as I am white but my husband is black. We were very uncomfortable in certain parts of Eastern Europe, so we may avoid Malta.

Agree Lonicera - I love Vienna, especially the Upper Belvedere with its fabulous collection of Klimt paintings. I used to live in Austria - just across the road from where Klimt spent his summer holidays.

It's like saying that Rome or Bruges or Lisbon is dull. I loved all of them - and Vienna

I can understand what the pp meant when they described Vienna as dull. Its a beautiful city, with such alot to see and do but it does have a distinct lack of atmosphere and vibrancy that other cities have. Its hard to describe but it just felt very sterile.

Regarding Vienna yes I know it has a very rich cultural heritage and lots of very interesting things to see and do. But @XiCi hit the nail on the head, utterly devoid of any atmosphere or "vibe" and this very difficult to get a real feel for the place. I wasn't there in summer however which I imagine is a lot better.

Best-
California coast
Whitsundays
Bruny Island in Tasmania
Margaret River
Assynt in Scottish highlands

Worst
Tangier- was either throwing up or being harassed, not very relaxing at all