Places that were a let down

[DarcyDear]

Have you ever been anywhere on holiday and felt it wasn’t what you thought it would be? My friend is just back from New York and absolutely hated it. I’ve never been let down by a holiday but I remember being really taken aback at the levels of poverty and homelessness when I visited Los Angeles in my youth.

Zanzibar.
I wasn't expecting it to be sooo resorty with minimal interaction with real life (and we didn't stay in 'resorts' or massive hotels). The isolation of tourists and locals was soooo weird. Beautiful scenery, but would never go back.

Agree with the comments about Costa Rica. The capital is so congested with traffic. Yes some wildlife and beaches were good, but I have been to better.
The food was rubbish. My husband got asked if he had tried the national cuisine: rice and beans!!
Also agree with the comments about Venice. It was a big disappointment.

Re. Dublín- Im surprised just how many people on here dislike it! I went a ‘few’ years ago (ok 1997) and we had a fabulous long weekend. I remember happy friendly vibes all weekend. Busy pubs, lots of laughter. Trinity, cobbled streets.

Has it changed a lot or am I just easily pleased ;)

NY - agree with others, just so dirty, smelly, seedy, uncared for.

Rome - agree that the pickpocketers and scam jewellery sellers really got very tiresome. It was also just so horribly busy I couldn’t enjoy it.

Surprised to see Venice on the list, it was one of the few places I felt was just exactly how I’d imagined it, if not even better. Also very busy but not nearly as stressful and overwlming as Rome.

Pisa - the leaning tower is surrounded by an absolute shithole. Litter everywhere. Ditto the pyramids in Egypt. So sad.

you loved it so much you haven’t returned in 3 decades

I've lived in most of those countries, so I think my opinion is based on more than a passing knowledge. Switzerland, I lived in 2 quite different areas. As I said, beautiful (everywhere really) but boring.

Not for nothing is Switzerland nicknamed Shitzerland by ex pats who reside there.

But by all means label people you know nothing about ignorant.

Which ones of the countries you hate have you lived in?

Shanghai. If you close your eyes so you can’t see the place names, you’d swear from every characteristic of the place that you were in London. Or that’s how I felt about it when I used to fly down for work every month. I am not a fan of London btw.

🤷‍♀️ sure.. I’ve travelled the world a few times since then. So much to see so many places to go, enjoyed all of it for different reasons. The only place we return to regularly ish, is Italy. I do think we need to visit more places in the uk. The roads put me off tho.

I’ve got Maltese family. The reason so many people see Malta as a giant building site is because a lot of it is. The complexities of it escape me but essentially there’s some sort of planning law that leads to people leaving one development unfinished to start another. So you get a lot of constant construction. Some stretches of bus routes feel more or less entirely half-done buildings. I noticed it myself.

I always enjoy these threads based on random and often quite unfair judgements! My favourite ever one ever was someone’s view on Jersey, where I live. Essentially they had expected it to be little villages, countryside and beaches (which is exactly what it is) but found instead it was just dual carriageway. There is one short stretch of dual carriageway between the airport and St Helier, the only town, and I can only assume they went there and back and nowhere else (people often did pre-Covid when it was common to have to bring legal documents over for signing and head straight back again) but it was a bit boggling that anyone would assume that tiny bit of the island entirely represented it! Even coming in to land you can see how green it is.

Surely back to Dublin now?

I found in Paris the beggars were targeting English people, every time they came near we’d speak a few words of German to each other and they actually changed direction and went for someone else. We don’t actually know much German but was mochtest du fur mittagessen? Ich Weiss nicht seemed to do the trick.

Malta and Barbados.

I went to the Algarve in the 80s as a kid and remember seeing fag butts everywhere on the beach. Has that got any better?

Cornwall can be overcrowded and hell to park in yes, but when you are a local you know the beaches that are less busy and the overrated places. For instance I wouldn’t bother going to St Ives or Padstow in July/August.

Why was it nick named Shitzerland though, that makes it sound like a mucky dump of a place, which it definitely is not.

I’ve lived in Switzerland and I love it for precisely the reasons you hate it. I don’t want to ‘do’ anything in Switzerland, I just want to ‘be’. I can sit and look at Switzerland all day.

I agree the cuisine is awful though.

Also I think a lot of it is apples to oranges. A lot of places have changed enormously in the last 20 years, some have come full circle, so comparing experiences of the same place without saying when you went is fairly useless. I’ve had dramatically different experiences in the same place over time as I’m sure many of us have.

Wow we thought the opposite how clean it was. Police absolutely everywhere . We felt so safe. Yes you could smell weed everywhere but that’s because it’s been legalised so novelty?
we loved it. Been twice now and going back year after next. Last went last year

Fuerteventura.

This is a thread about disappointing places that people holidayed in. It's really not on to start finger wagging about PPs not appreciating the authentic lifestyle of downtown Baghdad or the unique indigenous culture of Milton Keynes because they haven't LIVED there and have only been on a brief holiday.

It's about holidays! Stop acting so superior.

Fort William.

I am Scottish but never ventured that far North before. It was awful, food was all crappy Scottish stereotypes for the American tourists. Cheap greasy Haggis this and Haggis that. Couldn't get normal pub grub anywhere. Some of the most miserable and rude staff I've ever encountered in shops and pubs etc. I've been all over the world and was totally embarrassed by the way we treating tourists.

Whereabouts did you go? Cornwall is large and pretty varied.

unique indigenous culture of Milton Keynes

😂😂 everywhere has its charms if you look closely enough

I've been to Cornwall twice and it's lovely (if very crowded) but is it worth the 8 hour drive from London? Not really. If I'm going to do a long drive to a UK holiday place it would be Pembrokeshire every time.

And another, Scarborough - horrible empty shell of a dump.

I’m not Scottish but have been to Fort William loads of times,it’s one of our overnight stops on our way to Wester Ross/Skye. We like it.