Tourism disappointment. Next to food disappointment, is there anything worse? You plan a trip and you hear so much hype about somewhere or something and when you get there you think...HUH? Is that IT?!
I had that experience after paying 50 euro to go up the Burj Khalifa in Dubai. It's the tallest building in the world and when I got to the top I realised I really didn't care. BORING!
The listeners of The Early Breakfast got in touch this morning and told of their travel woes - overwhelmingly, the Mona Lisa won for the most underwhelming experience ever. Apparently it's really tiny and really far away...noted. Have a look:
- “Morning Paula haven't been there so won't be going, but I heard from people that the Grand Canyon looks like a big quarry. We have one of them here in Skibb, no need to go to Vegas for that!” - Trev in Skibb
- “The Empire State Building. Long queues for tourists for not that great of a view!”
- “Hollywood. That place is just awful Paula!”
- “Niagara Falls. The Falls on their own could be beautiful if they were out in nature, but no, they're surrounded by suck tacky stuff all around them!”
- “Louvre is a fantastic experience but not because of Mona Lisa. That painting is sooo small and sooo far away so it's just such an anti-climax!”
- “Ann Frank’s house in Amsterdam - queue for over 2 hours and it takes 15 mind to see the whole house. Don't waste your time ever!” - Sean in Monaghan
- “New Yoik {yep - say it right} - New Yoik - so bad I won't go there twice!” - Dave, Clondalkin.
- “Paula. The Giants Causeway! I saw it when 13 and was filled with thoughts of Cú Culainn and Giants but what I got was small black rocks in weird positions!” - Mick
- “Hi Paula - in Dubrovnik last month. 20 euro to walk the town wall! Rip off to walk 1.9 km!” - Sean
- “Hi Paula, Bondi Beach was the biggest disappointment ever, Irish beaches much nicer. Listen to you every morning, love your show!”
- “A few years ago while in Singapore myself and one of the lads decided to visit a maritime museum. We got a taxi to take us the 30 miles there, when we got there it was on a navy base where we had to hand in our passports. As you expect, we said this is going to be fantastic! But to our disappointment it was like a really old dirty shed with a few photos on the wall. If that wasn't bad enough, when we went to leave we couldn't get a taxi back, so we had to flag a car down on the motorway and pay the driver to take us back. When we got back we told the rest of the group it was brilliant because they were laughing at us for going!” - Jayo
- “Lego land is just one massive gift shop with a couple of crappy rides (with stupid queues) in between!”
- “I think the Eiffel Tower is ugly, even worse up close!”
- “Stonehenge Paula. Oh look...rocks.”
- Morning Paula - many years ago myself and a very ex-girlfriend were at EuroDisney. The major attractions had a thing called a fast pass which you could use for some of the rides. For the rest of the rides you had to queue at the long queue. When we joined a queue for one of the attractions we thought we would be there for 45 minutes. When we got to the top of the queue we discovered that the queue was as long again around the corner. We decided to stay with it having invested 45 minutes. After another 45 minutes we discovered the queue was longer again. After more than two hours queueing we got on children's ride! We didn't talk to each other for the rest of that day!” - Conor
- “We were on a lads weekend in Berlin. Lots of beer, not so much sightseeing. We had a few hours to put down before our flight so 4 off us decided to see the Brandenberg Gate, checkpoint Charlie and the wall remains. Following one fella (a garda who "knew the way") we turned right out of our hotel. We walked 2 hours in flip flops and had 5 mins to see them by the time we got there. We decided to get a taxi back. We flagged one and he laughed at us. Our hotel was 2 mins away if we had turned left coming out the door we’d have saved ourselves all the bother!”
- “Paula, Las Vegas. What a rotten place! Planned 5 days there, left after 2!”
- “Leaning Tower of Pisa Paula. Looks so stupid, as do all the people taking photos pretending to hold it up!”
- “Taj Mahal. Full of people trying to scam you!”
- “Hi Paula. It has to be the Great Barrier Reef for me. Was in Cairns for 4 days, 3 of which were in doors in the local establishments. My mate said on the fourth that we better see something while we were there and get some pictures. So got a boat trip out and either of couldn't hardly stand up going out not to mind get in the water. Oh the curse of the drink!”
- “Paula, one of my best friends gave me the name of her favourite restaurant in the whole world, in New York and I booked it for a special dinner for a group of friends on my last visit. Talk about disappointment: the food was only alright, the service was terrible & the restaurant was freezing cold. Plus the place was very pricey & I was so embarrassed to have recommended my friends go there. Insult to injury when we told front of house we didn't enjoy our night they ignored us. I'll never go back!”
- “New Year's Eve at Times Square. 4 hours of standing in the cold!”
- “Got a day trip to Bahamas while in Miami. 4 hrs on the way over and 6 on way back. 1 hour and a half on the island and it rained. Myself and the wife didn't speak on the way back!” - Gary T
- “Paula went to see the Holy Stone of Clonrichert, smaller than the pictures and definitely shouldn’t be class 2 monument!” - P
