Where is the most overrated holiday destination you’ve been?

[phoanymoany]

Where have you been on holiday and thought “wow, that was a waste of my time and money”.

Mine was travelling to a fairly remote tropical island where people were supposed to be so friendly. Unfortunately we found the people we interacted with in the hotels and restaurants to be anything but nice. It piddled down with rain and then we almost got scammed.

I went to Dublin 25 years ago as part of a driving around Ireland holiday with a good friend. We really liked it! Then I went back to Dublin with some friends for a long weekend about 5 years after my first visit. It was awful. Remember Temple Bar had changed and had loads of touts trying to get you into their pub and it all felt very threatening. Was completely different the first time. Very chilled and maybe less full of tourists I suppose.

Tenerife was boring with crap weather. To be fair I wasn't expecting much.

Paris can be hit or miss. I don't mind it.

@LillianGish We were doing a similar trip to you, stayed in a beautiful home just on the edge of the park, say on the veranda watching the hummingbirds and went into the park each day of our three day stop over just totally overwhelmed by the beauty. I hope to go back.

I went on a cheap holiday in Tunisia (Monastir I think) and absolutely hated it. We were harassed non stop (two lone young women) and the hotel and food wasn't anything special. I wasn't expecting much but it fell way below.

But then I filmed there for work and it was a completely different experience - we shot in Tunis, Sidi Bou Said, the desert right down south, Chott El Djerid, in the mountains with waterfalls and incredible views, Djerba, El Jem, Tozeur, different oasis... it was so beautiful, the food was delicious and we had an amazing time.

Alcudia Majorca - a literal swamp, mosquitoes to the extreme! Cigarette butts all over the beach. Grim.

Los Angeles - California is an absolutely amazing state, but LA is the most unsafe I’ve ever felt. Technically if you get to certain areas, it’s okay, but for the most part I’d just leave LA and go elsewhere.

Miami - the most horribly unfriendly place I’ve been in the US. Traffic is horrible, loads of grim areas. Only worth it as a hub to visit the Keys and the Everglades.

I had a few days there just before Christmas - the red light district is just one defined area so you can avoid it. The rest of Amsterdam is lovely - amazing museums, nice shops and pretty canals. Public transport is clean and efficient

I second this, it’s very contained. I loved Amsterdam, we didn’t visit either the red light district or the infamous cafes. There is so much more to see, so easy to get around, and I felt very safe the whole time. Great cafes and bakeries too.

The Amalfi Coast. It’s beautiful, absolutely, but Americans are so enamoured of it, and it’s not all that. So I think it is overrated even though it’s not a place I disliked at all. In fact, I really liked it but tourist traps abounded, the food is good but it seems food from Campania is the “standard” Italian food around the world so it didn’t feel like a culinary discovery the way food in other parts of Italy sometimes seems. Pompeii was great but did it as part of a guided tour and felt rushed — would like to take more time to explore on our own (and also go to Herculaneum and Paestum next time). Basically, very attractive destination but overrated (and overpriced) compared to other parts of Southern Italy.

But then I filmed there for work and it was a completely different experience
I think this is an important point. You can get a very different view of a place depending on things like where specifically you stay,the time of year, what the weather is like, your health during your stay, even who you are with.
I'm perfectly happy to acknowledge that my negative view of the French Riviera is probably at least in part due to the fact that I was on crutches at the time and the heat made my recently broken limb swell up massively so I couldn't be very active. To me it was too hot, expensive and a bit boring.
Toronto on the other hand I loved, largely because I was travelling with a University friend who had relatives there. They were incredibly welcoming and had children of similar age to us who were lovely and took us out so we saw the city from a different perspective to a regular tourist.
I have very different feelings about New Dehli to my niece. I went with work, stayed in one of the most expensive hotels in the city, ate in top notch restaurants and had a personal driver. She was back packing, got robbed in a grotty hostel and had D&V for most of her stay. Same city, very different experiences.
I think we also tend to have higher expectations of places when we are on holiday because we've paid for a pleasurable experience, so something negative that happens on holiday probably colours your view of a place more than the same sort of thing happening at home. Like my DH hates Barcelona because our car was broken into there. We were burgled at home the following year but he didn't denounce the city we lived in at the time as a den of thieves and refuse to ever go there again! If you are the victim of crime anywhere it is upsetting of course but if you're on holiday it is often harder to deal with because you're not familiar with local police procedures and maybe don't speak the language and of course it spoils your trip. Nobody goes on holiday to spend it in a police station. So something like that can colour your view of a whole destination possibly unfairly.
Everyone's experiences are real, but they are probably influenced by lots of factors beyond the inate qualities of the destination.

@MrsAvocet exactly - everyone stays in different places with different budgets and local knowledge. I was in Bangkok about 3 weeks ago and fully accept that we had a lovely time partly because we were in a very expensive hotel by the BTS with a great pool and rooftop views for the fireworks on NYE. I loved getting around by skytrain but imagine having no pool and being stuck on the traffic filled roads would be a completely different experience in the heat.

Geneva is full of foreign diplomats and their families because of the United Nations, not just “migrants”.

And it’s the least “Swiss” city of Switzerland. (And I’m not too fond of it in general, tbh…). Definitely not the place I would recommend to a tourist.

Unless you had time to view various places and appreciate the “contrast”, I suppose l.

There's nowhere I have been that I absolutely hated. Maybe I have low standards 🤷‍♀️

A few places have been mentioned:

Jersey - some lovely parts, particularly in the north and west, away from St. Helier.

Tenerife - I'd love to visit the north away from the tourist resorts. Also to hike around the central volcano area. The south is quite spoilt from overdevelopment but if you take it for what it is (basic sun and sand holiday) it's fine.

San Francisco- 15 years ago it felt fine. Enjoyed a few days there. Homeless problem must have become more acute which is sad.

LA - didn't really get it. Seemed like more of a nighttime city. Took the underground around a bit - didn't realise they had one so that was a nice surprise. Day trip to Malibu, again lovely.

Rest of what I saw of California was amazing - would love to go back. Be a real shame if it's changed so much.

I think there's just too many people everywhere now.

Cornwall.

Lisbon and El Nido in Phillipines

Agreed went last year

Oh, bloody Brighton. Awful!

I haven’t been to NZ and bestie lives on North z island and yet I still feel reluctant to go . Something that just doesn’t sell NZ t me .

I lived in Germany for 4 years and loved it. The diet can be pretty meat-heavy, but there are a lot of alternatives these days. I'm off to Berlin for my birthday with my vegan niece - she's delighted to find there are plenty of places that cater to her.

I went in 2017 and loved it.

It’s a shame so many US cities have deteriorated.

Am frankly amazed that anyone would go on holiday to switzerland.

Switzerland isn’t a “cheap” place to visit admittedly, but it’s still worth visiting!

I've been to NYC approx 12 times since early 1990s as I have a close friend who lived there and is from there. I do love it, but my friend who's from Forest Hills (near Flushing, where US Open takes place) isn't enamoured. She finds the subway dirty and certain parts are/were a bit dodgy ( e.g. near Times Square). There are also certain places where she's told me "you go to get guns/drugs" and nothing else!

But the energy, people and everything to do there, I really like it!

I have to admit I was peeved having to pay to use the toilets at the motorway service station in Switzerland!

ooh, first time I've seen Seattle on one of these posts, I'm going in April. A week in the city and an Alaskan cruise.

Sorry, it must have been a Consul or a Envoy Extraordinary and Plenipotentiary who tried to nick my stuff simultaneously begging at the Central Station, I stand corrected.