What’s the worst place you’ve ever been to?

[Jap Stammer]

Calella, Spain around 2002. Really run down and tatty. Lots of petty theft like bag snatching and pick pocketing. Not Spanish. Didn't like it and didn't feel safe leaving the hotel at night.

Booked in the olden days when you had to go into a travel agent and the lady who booked it said it was nice!

We went in the late '90s on a last-minute cheapie after an AI holiday we had originally booked had to be cancelled due to my missus losing her job.

Would rather have stopped at home - hotel was ancient and minging. Full of East Europeans with no concept of queuing. Trying to get breakfast or an evening meal was like a mass scrum - our son got elbowed in the face by a woman so she could get to the counter before him. Generally nowt left worth eating by the time we managed to get there - b@stards had hoovered the lot.

Resort itself was crap and expensive - had to cross a major road and train line to get to the beach.

Only found one boozer worth going to - Iirc it was a welsh-themed bar 'hosted' by a transvestite whose nightly act made Julian Clary sound like Michael McIntyre. Luckily a lot of what was being said went over the head of the young 'un.

Best part of the holiday was getting on the bus to back to the airport. Put me off mainland Spain for life.

 

[Deleted User 11453]

Did anyone visit Malia (Crete) in the early 90s?

Some of my former drinking partners went in 1994 and they reported that it was a bit edgy. I went to Ayia Napa instead.

 

[becs]

We went in the late '90s on a last-minute cheapie after an AI holiday we had originally booked had to be cancelled due to my missus losing her job.

Would rather have stopped at home - hotel was ancient and minging. Full of East Europeans with no concept of queuing. Trying to get breakfast or an evening meal was like a mass scrum - our son got elbowed in the face by a woman so she could get to the counter before him. Generally nowt left worth eating by the time we managed to get there - b@stards had hoovered the lot.

Resort itself was crap and expensive - had to cross a major road and train line to get to the beach.

Only found one boozer worth going to - Iirc it was a welsh-themed bar 'hosted' by a transvestite whose nightly act made Julian Clary sound like Michael McIntyre. Luckily a lot of what was being said went over the head of the young 'un.

Best part of the holiday was getting on the bus to back to the airport. Put me off mainland Spain for life.

Aye it was crap and expensive. We were on the edge of the resort and had to walk past a load of boarded up places to get to the main bars and restaurants. It wasn't well lit and undesirables hung around there so I was warned not to walk down there in the dark as that's when the bag snatching and pickpocketing was happening.

Mine was self catering. It was a hotel who had converted one block into apartments. They had two sets of prices in the bar and restaurant. Reasonable prices for residents and extortionate prices for non-residents. Self catering were classed as non-residents and had to pay the stupid prices, so I didn't bother eating or drinking there and self catered for the whole holiday.

I didn't find out until I got there that there was no maid service at all and no cleaning equipment to do it yourself. I had two small boys then who made a mess eating so the place was thick of crumbs that I had nothing to sweep up with. Then one of them knocked over a glass of orange juice so the floor was sticky. I had to beg for the loan of a mop and bucket to clean it up. They only provided one hand towel and two small bath towels per family. I put the hand towel on the floor as there was no bathmat and then we had to try and all get dried on two small towels. A few days into the holiday, a bloke from a family I'd been talking to round the pool knocked on my door with several towels. He'd had enough of trying to get dried on a damp towel after his children, so he'd broken into the maids linen cupboard and he was going up and down the corridors dishing towels out

Don't let it put you off Spain though. We went into Barcelona centre on the train, we went on a coach trip up into Andorra and hired a car to get to various other places. The actual days out I had were great - just the hotel and resort were rubbish!

 

[super noodles]

Albania

500,000 criminals apparently

And the BBC still gave them their own channel

 

[Mackem Tommy]

Can't even remember the name of the exact place but Tunisia, gash.

Hull's a bit of a dive. Thought it might've had a bit more of an airing than it has on here tbh.

 

[Boz33]

Did anyone visit Malia (Crete) in the early 90s?

Some of my former drinking partners went in 1994 and they reported that it was a bit edgy. I went to Ayia Napa instead.

Yeh I went in the early 90s was a bit of a 1 horse town, pubs and nightclubs and video bars, nowt like it turned into
Was dodgy in the respect of Greek lads following you when getting back at night pissed on your scooters trying to run you off the road etc so always a few scraps during the day, early evening (pre midnight) etc was fine

 

[Jap Stammer]

A mate's Dad once described Belize as 'the armpit of thee world'.

My eldest lad served in Afghanistan and described how scary it was doing doing sentry duty at night on a FOB (Forward Operating Base?). Pitch black all night - hear nothing, see nothing - even with searchlights on. When the sun rose there'd be little straw dolls about 6 feet away from the wall of the FOB. The Taliban's way of letting you know how close they'd got during the night.

 

[Mackem Tommy]

A mate's Dad once described Belize as 'the armpit of thee world'.

My eldest lad served in Afghanistan and described how scary it was doing doing sentry duty at night on a FOB (Forward Operating Base?). Pitch black all night - hear nothing, see nothing - even with searchlights on. When the sun rose there'd be little straw dolls about 6 feet away from the wall of the FOB. The Taliban's way of letting you know how close they'd got during the night.

That is quite terrifying in fairness.

 

[c032745y]

Almeria, folk living in caves...

 

[gazc24]

Honestly been over UK, Europe and Sulgrave in Washington sticks out

 

[TopCat]

I’ve been watching a lot of banged up abroad lately and got me thinking where is the worst place I’ve visited. I’ve not been too far a field but I went to Tunis a few years back, absolute dive and completely overridden with flies and just had a really eerie vibe

Atlanta - complete shithole and there's nowt to do there

 

[Steesafc]

Large parts of West Cumbria. Due to its geographical isolation it can feel like the land that time forgot.

 

[Switch]

Blackpool.

 

[muggboots]

Loved it.

Same here, although we did end up wandering a little too deeply into the rough bits one day. Edgy.

 

[offshore]

Gillingham is just grim and the town is like something out of day of the dead! My mate is from Budapest and I went to visit him a few years ago and it was scruffy!

 

[muggboots]

Off the beaten track in New Orleans is genuine 3rd world existence. There's nothing in this country compares to that. It was sad in some respects but dangerous at the same time. I got there about 5 in the morning and it reminded me of '80s documentaries on New York with the addition of shanty towns up the back streets. It's the only place I've ever been that I've thought I need to get to my hotel quickly or I'm going to be in serious bother. Well, there and Istanbul.

Funnily enough I was about to nominate my roughest as 42nd Street, Times Square and The Port Authority Bus Station in New York. Admittedly it was 1992 but believe me they hadn't spent the time since the 80s ended on improvements or regeneration. They had clearly spent it all on crack, boarding up shops, gowld chains like King Kong's handcuffs and menacing swagger lessons.

Not sure I get the port Clarence comments. I went through it recently and it just seemed like a really small estate with a shop?

It's improved massively in the last 20 years, they demolished the worst bits of it and used the spare roof tiles etc. to almost fix the remaining buildings. The criminal justice system and Natural Selection thinned out the local savages a bit. Better signposting, modern, faster, more secure cars with locking wheelnuts, better crash protection and low profile spearproof tyres hindered the locals ability to practice Mad Max style road piracy, predating on passing vehicles like piranhas, minus the teeth.

Workington around 1971, never returned.

It hasn't changed.

not many but had a bad experience in a taxi with some a few years ago near Sharm el Sheik (Naama Bay) when I was with my lass at the time, in fairness mind the ones I've met in this country (about half a dozen) have been spot on almost to a man. In fact one of the barmen in the ISIS (pub) is Egyptian and I was talking to him about Naama Bay and the Camel Bar not so long ago.

George in the Isis is a lovely lad.

 

[worcestermakem]

Funnily enough I was about to nominate my roughest as 42nd Street, Times Square and The Port Authority Bus Station in New York. Admittedly it was 1992 but believe me they hadn't spent the time since the 80s ended on improvements or regeneration. They had clearly spent it all on crack, boarding up shops, gowld chains like King Kong's handcuffs and menacing swagger lessons.

It's improved massively in the last 20 years, they demolished the worst bits of it and used the spare roof tiles etc. to almost fix the remaining buildings. The criminal justice system and Natural Selection thinned out the local savages a bit. Better signposting, modern, faster, more secure cars with locking wheelnuts, better crash protection and low profile spearproof tyres hindered the locals ability to practice Mad Max style road piracy, predating on passing vehicles like piranhas, minus the teeth.

It hasn't changed.

George in the Isis is a lovely lad.

I was in New York a year later and yes the missus was shit scared around the port authority.
There was a seemingly angry roaming gang of black lads who kept appearing on street corners around there.
Turned out they were protesting over their civil rights and were ok.
Women selling their bodies on the streets at 8 in the morning was depressing.

 

[Raich Carter]

Belfast was absolutely shit.

 

[muggboots]

I was in New York a year later and yes the missus was shit scared around the port authority.
There was a seemingly angry roaming gang of black lads who kept appearing on street corners around there.
Turned out they were protesting over their civil rights and were ok.
Women selling their bodies on the streets at 8 in the morning was depressing.

I think it was still the murder capital of the world then, a proper eye opener at 20 year old. Jamaica a week or so later was no bother at all.

 

[Deleted member 45261]

I think it was still the murder capital of the world then, a proper eye opener at 20 year old. Jamaica a week or so later was no bother at all.

I was in Manhattan for 5 days in '94 aged 22, stayed in the Remington Hotel on 46th & Broadway I think it was, we ventured over to Queens most days and ended up buying a car there off a bloke we met in a bar, I loved it in fairness but looking back me and my mate had no idea at that age although he was a little older (about 25) and we were both very lucky on a few occasions, mainly in drink.