Worst holiday destination you have been to

The Algarve

Orange and grey Brits, cold sea , nuff said.

Kuta, Bali

They can it the Aussie Magaluf but it’s nothing like as nice as Magaluf.

I was also slightly underwhelmed with Croatia, mainly because the hotels were a bit crap. Dubrovnik, Split and Hvar are interesting towns but there’s not much else going on.

Canary Islands. Can’t even mine which wan I went to. Terrible. Loads of fat Brits abar the place tucking into thon full English and pints of thon carling. Cat.

Heh tel aviv was nearly two years ago 

I did honestly feel quite scared when we accidentally ended up in the abandoned lower levels (not unreasonably I thought buses would be on the ground - bizarrely they go from the very top on a massive ramp)

Minehead Butlins, aged about 10. With my father and grandparents, in the p1ssing rain.  My father and I still laugh about how awful it was 30 odd years on. 

Otherwise I think I have (overall) enjoyed pretty much everywhere I have been. Stayed in a few terrible hotels as a skint youngster but have never really been to the really sh1tty tourist places on the Med or in Asia. Spent one night in Playa de las Americas once and that was enough... 

Also once stayed on a really average golf resort in Tenerife with my first proper gf (as we basically got to stay there for free through, iirc, her aunt) but it wasn't unpleasant just very boring as we were the youngest people there by about 30 years, it was in the middle of nowhere and we couldn't hire a car (as were aged 19). Still, there was a lot of shagging so it wasn't all bad. 

Tunisia was a bit ropey (mainly just poor choice of hotels) but worth it to see Dougga and El Jem

 

 

 

The actual worst place I have ever seen that claims to be a holiday resort was pontins in camber sands 

we were staying in a nice hotel down the road and went in search of a minimart 

truly truly horrific. Made butlins look 5*

Heh Butlins is (or at least was 30 years ago, it may have have changed by now) just my idea of hell.  A million noisy kids (I was a very antisocial child) and enforced fun in the evening.  We went to see the 'Show' and a female redcoat (if that is the right colour coat?) came and sat on my grandfather's lap and sang to him.  It was all just so very, very cringe. Also the food was fvcking terrible.  

The Bahamas, for what it costs and expectations, outside of the private islands it's been turned into a lifeless, clinical America-lite, you could be anywhere and at the same time nowhere. 

heh @ Laz - maybe after I had gone to bed... 

I do wonder looking back if it was the best night he had had in 30 years. I mean the lady in question was on the rotund side and certainly not young but then he would have been about 75 at the time...

I also thought Quito was ace.  Had a couple of great nights out there and its the only place I have ever really enjoyed a football match.  The atmosphere was amazing.  

+1 for Morocco. Essaouira is nice during the day but has a proper 'death to the west' vibe at nightfall. Tangiers may have been sexy decades ago, but now it's just a muggers paradise. 

Not sure I've ever had a bad holiday, always been able to have a good time due to the people I was with, even in some dodgy places - 2 star hotels in tenerife for example.

Sydney probably the most overrated. It's a long way to go for a bridge. 

Very surprised to see Thailand and Negril on this list. And Marrakech is much less dodgy than it used to be - apparently there was a recent crackdown on tours/hassling tourists. 
 

Haven’t really ever been anywhere I haven’t enjoyed but I do a lot of holiday research before going anywhere. 

Weirdly mine is the same as the best holiday I have been on.

Wadi Rum desert in Jordan.  First night was amazing, eating round a campfire under the stars, then a camel trip around the desert (including my wife being chased and nipped by a particularly over protective mother camel), climbing the rocks, surfing down dunes as high as a house, drinking from a nabatean well, seeing lawrence of arabia's shack, having tea with the bedou.  Another beautiful evening with stars beyond imagination and amazing food.

The next day it was a sand storm.  That fcker hurts worse than sunburn.  Then in the evening, a coach party of 100 iraquis arrived and played terrible drum and base music until 6am despite being asked several times to stfu.  "It is our culture Eeeeenglish, you do not belong here".

Fcking w**kers.  This is the reason I am comfortable with TB's decision to bomb the fck out of them.

Obviously I am not the first roffer to haave been in Jordan...

‘The actual worst place I have ever seen that claims to be a holiday resort was pontins in camber sands ‘
 

I worked there as a cleaner when I was back from uni one summer. 
the things I saw....

Minehead butlins pretty good in the good accommodation, and Exmoor on your doorstep. 

Algarve superb out of season. Just take a wetsuit if you are a pansy. 

Tenerife is terrible save for Siam Park. 

Bali generally rubbish. 12 hours on a plane to swim in sea colder than in Africa surrounded by Expat Dubai types living in Singapore or HK or, as pointed out above, Australians. 

Dubai is just terrible. 

Arc 1800 takes some beating in terms of ugliest ski resort, though Avoriaz a close second. 

 

Never had a holiday I booked I'd call standout bad (but trips to Algarve as a kid were fairly crap).  Travelling from Essaouira to Marrakesh, we decided to stop the night in a city called Safi.  It's the most unpleasant place I've ever been.  Think it was just a big iodine factory.  

Two come to mind that I've been to and would avoid - 

My first time to San Fran I was not a fan, but on subsequent visits I like it. Los Angeles is kind of a shit hole and I don't get the appeal, personally.

Outside of tourist pockets like Ipanema and Copacabana it's downright scary in Rio. Though I do think everyone should go once?

Generally not a great fan of Spain, although I do want to get to the north where the uber foodies love.

Everywhere else I've been I think I must try to justify as having been worth it, because nothing comes to mind. Nothing terrible, 

 

Also Negril? It's the only part of Jamaica that I like! I haven't been in a few years mind you, but it wasn't that long ago and the beach is one of the best in the world. Safe and lovely. To each their own.

Pontins Southport. 1983.

We hadn’t been on holiday before. My mum won a £50 pontins voucher in a raffle or something. The brochure promised so much. 

The “cinema” was a projector in the bar. I remember being sat with loads of other kids as we enjoyed Sweeney 2. Those of you who’ve seen that film will remember the appearance of full bush in the first 5 minutes. The film ends with someone shooting themselves in the head with a sawn-off shotgun.

The boating lake was a circle of concrete filled with rainwater. Not one of the boats worked. They either had holes in or the paddles didn’t turn.

I blew my holiday money on the first day in the arcade.

I spent most of my time swimming in the freezing cold pool. There was nothing else to do. I got a terrible cold.

I don’t remember the food. 
 

 

 

 

No full holiday comes to mind but bits of some were not great in the grand scheme of things. 
 

Marrakech with a friend about 6 years ago we got conned into a souk stall and I was made to wait whilst my friend had to go off on a moped with the stall owner to get money. 
 

Rome around 3 and a half years ago was beautiful save for the 45 minute walk along the hard shoulder up the motorway as we missed our bus stop for the airport. That was me, 2 other non rof friends and cookie so he’d attest to the horror of that moment. I tried to keep everyone’s minds off possible imminent death by pointing out starling murmerations (Sp?) and saying “not long now” like your dad!

I remember the food hall at butlins minehead from a holiday circa aged 7. The smell of the mass produced soup I can still conjure now. And small glasses of orange juice as a “starter”. 

The beach at Camber is great but otherwise the Marshes are too flat and bleak to really be called beautiful and most of the houses tucked behind the beach are awful.

Kuta was awful. My friend and I walked to the beach (where you couldn’t lie facing away from the beach as old ladies would be shouting at you to buy their stuff - they weren’t allowed to cross a certain line) and my friend who was was wearing a bikini top got her boob groped by a local on our way there. 
 

I liked Cairns and lived there for a couple of months. 
 

I also went to Cyprus and stayed near Aya Napa in the most revolting resort full of brits abroad. Luckily I was in honeymoon period of new romance so we just shagged non stop and played scrabble. 

 

Where the fook is Camber Sands?

Paris and San Francisco both in the same box for me. Not terrible and therefore don’t belong on this thread, and both really interesting on paper and, to a lesser extent, irl. But I’ve never actually had a good time in either.

Any crappy resort in the UK, the one in Budleigh Salterton springs to mind.

They are full of the same people and food as awful resorts like Playa de Las Americas except the weather is crap and when you find yourself wondering around the Big Morrisons in town you realise that you're not even on holiday, just somewhere worse than your house

I’ve got memories of flying out to join the wife in Paris for a weekend after she’d been there for a work conference. Tiny hotel room miles from anywhere good. I remember watching a Valuev fight on cable TV in that room - it was against a fat guy who was Kazakh or something but based out of Germany - I forget his name. That said, we went up to Montmartre one day, that was good.

Cuba is another mild disappointment - probably not as interesting as I expected, and it is impossible to capture in words how bad the food is. Too marks for atmospheric bars and crumbling grandeur tho

I've been to Paris 3 times and loved it every time. 
 

I liked Dublin but I'm glad we were there to go to something rather than just for a weekend - it's very small and there isn't that much to do 

I remember one particularly dull holiday in a pontinsesque holiday village in cornwall when I was about 7. 

My dad trod barefoot on a giant orange slug which had crawled in through the giant gap under the front door.

It pissed it down for ten days.  The pool was unheated and slightly colder than the polar icecap.

They ran activities for children from which I was banned - you had to invent a cartoon villain and I came up with a fox called Jaques The Bastard.

After this we only went to Eurocamp paces in the trailer tent which were acers

"They ran activities for children from which I was banned - you had to invent a cartoon villain and I came up with a fox called Jaques The Bastard."

LOL

How the fook do trailer tents even work

OMFG the food in Cuba, you are a caribbean island, how do you fukc that so badly!

Cuba was literally flipping between oh wow thats cool to urgg WTF every other minute

‘Dublin is awful. Not much to see, mediocre and expensive pubs. Gushing Americans everywhere. Fvck that.‘
 

hard agree with all of that + expensive and terrible weather

Dublin is OK.  once you have done the bus tour and the guiness museum and the jamesons factory there is pretty much fck all else to do apart from eat hotwings at the hard rock cafe.

I too have been to butlins minehead with my grandparents, I was about 8 and it was the first time I got really bad hay fever, I also remember they had a big indoor slide, I met Bailey there for the first time too so it was extra crap

your mates are a bunch of pussies. I literally don't know anyone who disliked the place. Scared of getting shot?? They must have a hearto at the thought of anything east of shoreditch roundabout.

We went there to go to a gig, and stayed in a nice hotel and had a fry up and Guinness and that was nice. I didn't need more than 24 hours there. Funnily enough I could easily imagine living there - especially in the beautiful Georgian townhouses our past the university. 
 

 

Ohh Flaine in France, went there with a girlfriend, neither of us could ski so thought we would learn together- we both hated it and the resort was like a council estate inexplicably built on top of a mountain.  Weather was also shyte.  Bars and restaurants terrible.

I think I'm just biased towards good beer. If the beer's not good, I'm not really into drinking. Don't get me wrong, I'd enjoy a mosey around Dublin for a couple of days.

Dublin is great and so is Cork. It's not about sightseeing, it's the pubs and the people. Stayed in a crappy area of Dublin when I was about 17 and on trip alone, propped up the bar in a grungy pub and ended up being taken on a drunken pub crawl with a massive group ranging from teenagers to 80 year olds. Brilliant place. 

Rio was a bit shit I thought. Christ the Redeemer was blow away awesome, the rest seemed a bit dodgy and not very pleasant. 

EVERYONE said OMG are you going to Quito it’s horrible and you’ll get shot

WTF says that?

That said, I struggled with the altitude and the bloke I went to the football with (a Septic expat who supported Spurs) turned out to be a neo-Nazi. He was unaware of Spurs' Jewish links and looked crestfallen when I told him.

"What's wrong with Thailand, decent food, friendly people, good weather."

 

plastic everywhere on the beach, plastic that the tide keeps bringing, for example