OUR BIG TRIP
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LEAST FAVOURITE DESTINATIONSBackpacking through Europe, Asia and America was a once in a lifetime experience and along the way we saw some amazing sights that will stay with us for the rest of our days.
However it was not all a bed of roses as at times there were some sights, places and activities that were not particularly enjoyable. Below is a list of our top 10 least favourite destinations. To read a full account about our stay in each destination please click on the cities name. If I was to tell you that the thing we liked best about our time in Winnipeg was when we left for our next destination it goes some way to conveying how much we hated the place. The city simply has nothing going for it. No soul. No charm. Few sights or attractions and a distinctly gritty air resonating from its appearance as a depressing concrete jungle of non-descript high rises and faceless brown commercial buildings. Furthermore with a dearth of decent restaurants and cafes and perhaps the most unfriendly population of any destination we stayed in Winnipeg is undoubtedly the worst place that we had the misfortune of visiting on our entire big trip. I can safely say hand on heart that we will never go there again in our lives. One of the biggest rubbish dumps in the world, Naples is a city overflowing with litter. Add to that the chaos that comes with being one of the most densely populated urban centres in Europe, its a proliferation of grimy, decaying buildings and the result is pretty unappealing. Furthermore as the city radiates a rather seedy and nefarious air one does not feel that safe there, even inside our hotel behind the security of 3 locked docks. Overall a close second to Winnipeg. The only thing preventing Naples from being the worst city we visited was that we ate a really nice pizza there. Like Winnipeg though we will never go there again. On the whole the Greek Islands are some of the most beautiful and relaxing places to visit in the world. An oasis of sand, warmth and tranquility that seems a close relative to Paradise. Whereas Santorini and Amorgos are fine examples of this sadly Rhodes is not. Positively teeming with British, Scandinavian and German lager louts, most of the Rhodes' history and allure seems lost behind a thick wall of high rise apartment hotels and loud nightclubs belting out dance music tunes until 5am. The beaches are incredibly crowded, whilst hiring out sun lounges are expensive. Even the food has lost its authenticity. Being diluted down to cater for the mainstream tastebuds of tourists. After enjoying such a wonderful stay on other quieter islands our time here was, by comparison, awful. After the delights of Beijing our visit to Shanghai was a major disappointment. Possessing none of Beijing's charisma, charm or appeal we found the city offered little to us. Shopping was more expensive and less fun than it was in the nation's capital and with a marked lack of tourist attractions and sights to entertain us we found ourselves essentially killing time here. The pervasive veil of smog that engulfed the city was none to inspiring either and the frequent tropical rainstorms that battered the region did little to improve our mood. In the end we clocked Shanghai as just another big city and could not wait to get out of there. I read a quote that accurately summed up Vienna for me. It read something like 'I have bad news for you. Old Vienna used to be new'. How true this reads. Once truly grandiose, Vienna just over 100 years ago was considered one of Europe's finest cities. Yet today the decaying buildings that lamented this position paint a very different story. With its architecture in need of a serious makeover we found modern day Vienna to be rather unremarkable and decidedly nondescript. What once made Vienna so great seems to have gone and in essence it could now be any big city in the world. Although a place we felt compelled to visit it is somewhere we would not choose to go to if we were to do the trip again. Not much went right for us in Catania. We came here to take a 4WD tour up Mount Etna but the inclement weather that hit Sicily put paid to that. Indeed so hard did it rain that ensuing cloud cover obscured the mountain from our view for the entirity of our stay here. Add to that misfortune our terrible night in the hostel and the complete absence of anything to do here other than visit the Hard Rock Cafe for lunch and dinner and it was a pretty depressing stay all round. Not somewhere I especially want to visit again in a hurry. Arriving here with Hollywood inspired visions our visit to Sicily's capital was rather disappointing. Having expected to find ourselves cast into the last bastian of the pre-modernised Italian world we were upset to find ourselves in a charmless big city with no real character. With nothing to do, nothing to see and very few options in the way of decent restaurants we again found ourselves counting down the hours until the next ferry. The dark, dimly lit streets at night did little to enhance Palermo's asthetic, nor did the fact that we witnessed a middle aged women being mugged by a teenager. All in all not the nicest place in the world. I am glad that I have no reason to go back there. A grim, desparate town whose appeal to us was further reduced when we found out that it is a notorious relocation point for convicted sex offenders and those in the witness protection programme. Surrounded by a thunder of traffic and a gaggle of decrepid boarded up buildings parts of Fargo really were quite desolate. Unpleasantly so. I really would not fancy strolling round its downtown at night. Especially where the Greyhound station was situated. Thankfully our hotel was a little way away from here. A pretty dull city with hardly anything to offer the traveller except for a convenient stop over point to or from Canada, our stay in Portland, Maine was very drab and uneventful. Although we had a very nice room, considering that we were staying there during the Thanksgiving holiday when hardly any shops or restaurants were open, and the fact that its location directly opposite the Greyhound bus station, encouraged the reappearance of a congregation of winos and beggars which had been thankfully missing in the latter part of our time in Canada, our visit here was rather depressing. The only redeeming feature the city has is that it holds a genuine piece of the Berlin Wall and also contains one half decent Indian restaurant. However that could only keep us amused for so long and as such it is not a place that we can really recommend. Although New Orleans has some good points, in particular its cuisine and the fabled good old southern hospitality, it is not a city that makes you especially comfortable. There are many distinct no go areas that our hotel receptionist told us in no uncertain terms not to visit and in support of this we saw enough evidence of crime, namely an attempted pickpocketing and the presence of a knife wielding thief on the tram in front of us, to make us feel very wary during our time here. Infact as access to our hotel room was gained by walking out into the street and opening a set of wooden stable type doors on the sidewalk we always found ourselves looking over our shoulders. Even when in our room. It was rather unpleasant but despite this overall we enjoyed our time in New Orleans and I feel it is a place that everyone must see. Although whether it is a place that everyone must see again is very much open to debate.
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