To ask which country you would not visit again and why?

[travelcat]

I love hearing about travel experiences and am interested in knowing about places you have visited that you wouldn't go back to.

AIBU to ask which country you'd avoid in the future and what specifically made your experience less enjoyable? Was it due to culture, safety, or something else?

Egypt for the same reasons as everyone else - very hard going as a female traveller.
I loved lots of things about Georgia but we were so ill, both of us got food poisoning on and off a few times through the 2 weeks we were there, I don't know if we were just unlucky but I wouldn't rush back.

Morocco. It's just a constant stream of sexual harassment being on the streets as a modestly dressed western woman. Only place I've really felt unsafe travelling.

@FoxtrotOscarFoxtrotOscar what did you dislike about Serbia, I've only be once on a quick visit but keen to return for a longer time.

Absolutely despised Morocco, pervy men at every turn. Felt like the locals were trying to take unfair advantage of tourists at every opportunity.

A part of Turkey. I know it is a lovely country and the people are v friendly etc. but.....

I stayed two nights in Kusadasi while visiting Ephesus up the road. Fair enough it is a resort town, but the one thing that really got me was the amount of MEN everywhere, and the women never to be seen. Shops, restaurants, tour guides, you name it, all men. I felt the women were confined out of sight in the bowels of the kitchens or cleaning the toilets as that was their worth. Ephesus was amazing though, but I won't be going to Turkey again. And as a pp said the regime of Erdogan is something I do not want to support either.

Morocco - immigration line takes forever. The way they treat animals is shocking. Lots of scams in the souks. Also, everyone who I know who has been there has ended up with some gastrointestinal disease!

I can’t see me going back to Russia anytime soon. Same for Ukraine although unlike Russia I quite enjoyed my visits there. Kiev was far more welcoming than Moscow.

China - awful people (I appreciate that’s a sweeping statement covering about 1/5th of the world’s population!)

Dubai - too dull a place to bother visiting again

Egypt for me too. I loved the history etc but got groped three separate times (including some gross shopkeeper pressing his erection up against my thigh while 'helping me try on a scarf') and generally leered at and perved over constantly. Might be better now I'm pushing middle age and more confident, but this was when I was a shy 19 year old and I had no idea how to handle it!

What part of Thailand? I’ve been several times and would agree to an extent about some areas but those areas are well known and remainder of Thailand is beautiful.

Cuba

Dubai - out and about with my toddler and baby, men literally trappled over us, pushed us out of the way to get through doors that they then pulled closed behind them so we had a open for ourselves to get through. Eerily haunting in the evenings. I liked how clean it was, but will not go again

Greece, too hot and I was meant to be surprising my parents who were going there but my dad died the week before I went, mum still went because the entire family was going. Fucking awful.

Certainly don’t fancy North Africa or Turkey, I’ve heard the behaviour of some of the men towards women is appalling. I don’t understand the attraction of Dubai, a friend keeps going and is always on about the shopping. Don’t get it and certainly don’t want to be in a country where women are treated so appallingly or a man can be imprisoned for accidentally bumping into another man.

Seconded. Never felt so unsafe as a woman as I did in Turkiye.

ARSEHOLES foisting stuff on you in shops and markets. Even had one bloke grab my arm and put bracelets onto me and try to demand I pay for them!

I travelled to South Africa for work and felt very uncomfortable but only because I was the only Black female in a group of white colleagues and we went to restaurants and bars where there were no Black people at all apart from the staff. It was very depressing and really brought home the stark inequality in the country. Then going back to a luxury hotel and driving past townships where people live in glorified tin sheds with no electricity. My colleagues seemed oblivious and just talked excitedly about going wine tasting with our client. When I suggested a trip to the Apartheid museum on one of our free days they looked uneasy and said it would be a ‘bit depressing’.

I would go back to SA but not with work.

Egypt. Admittedly I went around 10 years ago but I felt so unsafe as a woman. I was harassed and touched by men all day every day. Had a massage in a 5 star hotel and was SA’d by the male masseur. Never again.

Bangkok and Koh Samui

Turkey, got leered at and grabbed quite a bit, an old man grabbed me and pulled me into an alert and towards some stairs going up to an apartment/flat , it was horrific. I was in my twenties and with two female friends, but (not that it should matter) we dressed fairly modestly had a few drinks - restaurants/a bar and a few glasses of wine rather than smashed in a club at 3am etc and got treated like meat. I don't really care that I might get treated differently going now with a husband, it's that kind of attitude I avoid.
Ditto Marrakech and I went with DH (other parts of Morocco were lovely and very different)

Dubai - it's true that it's 'Milton Keynes in the desert'.

Dubai. The most utterly soulless place I've ever wasted money visiting

Hmm I don't think I've ever been anywhere that I'd categorically never go back to but least likely would be UAE. We actually lived in Dubai and it was generally fine but just not my kind of place. Agree with the comments about being too commercial, money-grubbing and the inequality. Never experienced any problem as a western woman living there though.

Turkey, Morocco and Greece. Same reason for all three - the men.

Some parts of the US. Too bloody trigger-happy.

Dubai, just tacky

Lots of hate for Dubai, I personally love it there and go often.
I don't think I've been anywhere I wouldn't re visit yet.

Wouldn’t be rushing back to Egypt. Obviously sites are amazing, but I was sexuallly assaulted at Luxor temple. I didn’t really think much of it at the time (was a very innocent and quite blasé late teen) but in retrospect this was a gang of men who were looking for young women like me who were old enough to “siphon off” from groups, and it was really gross. I think I was lucky to get away with relatively minimal interference.
i also found it really difficult to see how nonchalantly people were smoking in and generally disregarding many do the sites including the valley of the kings. Why wasn’t the country taking care of these assets that were surely attracting significant inward flow of cash?

I was last there nearly 20 years ago mind, maybe things have radically improved.

Gosh pretty surprised to see some of the places on the list here. I have been to most of them and absolutely love some of the ones mentioned.

I lived in Dubai and it is soul less, commercial and has it's inequality - though I think other countries are worse for inequality its just tourists don't visit them.

I wouldn't rush back to Saudi Arabia but have no issue with most countries mentioned. The Gambia doesn't sound very nice though.