[Closed] Top UK Disappoinments

No one goes to Fort William because of what it is, they go for where it is and it's busy enough at that. Imagine how even more busy it would be if the town was as decent as the location?

Brexit?

Buckingham Palace

London.

The greatest city on earth..... 😆

Stone henge

Newport. concrete jumble, nothing in order, not far from the border.

lowestoft

The most easterly part of Britain and nothing there worth seeing

Gainsborough, the place sounds like a fancy painting, not some wharfs and warehouses on a flat muddy Trent.

Any market town. They're all shit.

Fort Willy could be great but I imagine it needs some financial input!

What is there around there? A distillery & an Ally smelting plant? (or something) Forestry stuff? Where do all the local working people actually work?

I've been to Fort William about 100 times & am always disappointed with the actual town. It's just a grey, miserable dump.

Any market town. They're all shit.

Leyburn, Boroughbridge?

Scotland does a good line in towns that sound nice and promise so much yet deliver so little.

Aviemore, Mallaig, Fort William, Campbelltown, Banff, Thurso I'm thinking of you.

I was up near Banff for work and met a group of Dutch folk on a tour. They were funny but a bit odd - they took a holiday every year exploring the nether regions of the UK. They loved run down seaside towns and ex mining back waters. They were very excited by it all. This year was "NE Scotland excluding the nice bit" tour. I suggested they try South Lanarkshire next time, maybe North Ayrshire.

I thought Biggar would be.

Llanelli. And worse, Ammanford. Ammanford is at the western end of the Brecon Beacons so surely must have something going for it? Nope.

Llanelli, in its defence has good transport links so that you can leave reasonably quickly, something I do daily.

Newport. concrete jumble, nothing in order, not far from the border.

I think most UK coastal towns fall into this category. There's this emotional attachment to places like Felixstowe, with its quaint little beach houses and amusement arcades but, in reality, it's just a worn out Victorian-era resort with nothing going for it at the end of a road.

Lowestoft also fits in that category, saved slightly by the Broads being close by.

Brecon. I've worked there for over 10 years and it's a hole which is surprising given its location and other nearby towns such as Hay and Crickhowell.

Just booked tickets for legoland and judging by the reviews on trip advisor it must be high up on the list of disappointing places.

Historic Market Towns usually a bit shit.

Aviemore is great , how could you put it into this list . Good restaurants , pubs , it's clean busy , safe , and appears prosperous .

Haworth - just full of really weird shops.

[quote=Ramsey Neil ]Aviemore is great , how could you put it into this list . Good restaurants , pubs , it's clean busy , safe , and appears prosperous .

And is full of both holiday makers and folk that have moved to live here, so enough folk like it.

[i]However[/i], the main street is a complete eyesore and is unlikely to be improved when they build three retail units on what was Santa Claus Land.

Dan yr ogof show caves. Just take a trip down any French show cave to realise just how rubbish they are as a visitor attraction. Get beyond the show bit though and it is a fantastic cave 🙂

And Llandrindod Wells must have a special mention as one of the most bizarre and out of place towns in the UK

Land's End.

Dunno what I was expecting though.

Newton Aycliffe, conjured up an image in my mind off a quaint little town and turned out a horrible concrete shopping centre approached thru an industrial estate.

Fort William and Llanberris for me, both have a great mountian destination promise but in reality are just tired places. Tourism and poor local opportunity never helps things either.

Llanberris

Is Pete's Eats still going? Only reason to stop in town on the way home.

Is Pete's Eats still going? Only reason to stop in town on the way home.

Birmingham.

Britain's second city, so much potential, reasons to visit - not one.

Brentwood. The whole time I worked there, I didn't see a single vajazzle.

Couldn't disagree more about brum.

Yorkshire.
Expected more varied/interesting landscape but surprised at how flat a lot of it was and not all that bucolic. Very overrated.

Land's End.

Dunno what I was expecting though.

This?

[img] [/img]

Or this?

[img] [/img]

But you saw:

[img] [/img]

(Last two pics are actually Land's End. The first is Wren's Nest, Dudley, which, to be fair, exceeded expectations)

Chester.
Very pleasant, but dirty.
Loads of litter everywhere and the wall seems to be in current use as a public toilet.

Warwick

Just a nothing place

Not sure about including

And worse, Ammanford.

Also not sure I'd be disappointed by going to Newport, again what would you expect to be there? Hasn't exactly got a great reputation, suppose you might be disappointed if you didn't see a fight or something!
(note - I lived there for 10 years and genuinely loved it, I'd quite happily move back)

Agree with a lot of the others, Brecon and Llanberis particularly when you compare them to "outdoor activity" towns/villages in the Lakes, so much potential you'd think.

Jedbergh. Appears to be always about to close.

Fort William does deserve a special mention

The horrible loch frontage is an act of environmental vandalism

and the locals don't seem to have cottoned on to the fact its meant to be a tourist destination.

Aviemore has a shabby main street but its all together more pleasant

Fort William, great as a base to go and do stuff in the surrounding areas, crap as a place in itself, the highlight is Wetherspoons..
and it's got the crappest chippy I've ever been in, and I've been to Cumbernauld! [shudders]

and it's got the crappest chippy I've ever been in

Yeah and the Indian is shit too

Cadbury World.

Cheshire
The Vale of York (excluding York)

Our football team.

Anfield

The English electorate

[img] [/img]

The English electorate

It'll all come right now we're going back to our roots. The stench of disappointment will evaporate to be replaced by Proper Lager, Proper Cheese and Onion Crisps, Proper Pork Products and Proper English-nessness.

What part of 'proper' could ever be disappointing?

What part of 'proper' could ever be disappointing?

The proper-ganda?

^ Nah, only those leftie bed-wetters believe there was any of that. The only propaganda came from them, claiming it was all about 'racism' etc.

[img] [/img]

The national approach to pie making.

Fort Bill, Aviemore and Inverness are all disappointing.

Getting a casserole with a puff pastry lid, when you ordered a pie 😥

The predictability of Binners and his propieganda

I is an evangelist, innt?

[img] [/img]

Campbeltown and the Kintyre Peninsula. Not sure what I expected but I was very disappointed.

Why one of the richest people in the Country would want a home there, I have no idea.

I'm reading this thread with the theme that accompanied the chart rundown during Top Of The Pops circa 1987.

"At number twenty two we have Clacton-On-Sea with the ambience of jellied eels, nylon sports wear, BO and knackered Fords with leaking exhausts"

"Down one at twenty one, we have Luton with binge drinking, three-days worn underwear and sweaty kebabs"

Aviemore is great , how could you put it into this list . Good restaurants , pubs , it's clean busy , safe , and appears prosperous .

Too right. Aviemore is the most ideal place I'd like to live in the UK. We all know about the riding ... When I stay there it doesn't feel like anything else in the UK. Sure it's got its out of date Hotels etc but at least it has consumer activity and many great spots for food too.

It's the only place I would really want to move to.

There's never much for sale either.

North Yorkshire was an acute disappointment, obsessed about its wilderness to find Swaledale was a barren landscape denuded of any wildlife for the sake of the grouse shooting - having killed-off all the top predators, the ground was strewn with rabbit carcasses, shot to try and control the rampant population. I can take a walk locally and see buzzards, red kites and foxes, didn't see any there.

We walked 10 miles to Gunnerside to find the pub, shop and café all closed during lunchtime in July....with the Tour a few weeks earlier they'd obviously decided they'd had their fill of tourists.

To cap it off were the bikers at weekends, riding at stupid speeds on narrow roads, you could hear the engines screaming for miles - hardly peaceful!

If you think the bikers are bad in Swaledale, just head down to the Hawes - Ribblehead - Ingleton/Settle roads, they are bad enough that the ambulance crews park up nearby so that they are closer to the accident call outs 😥

The King's Head in Gunnerside is a bit odd but there's a lot worse (well it's the landlords really).

Aviemore for me is on the list because its ugly, busy, and right next to a massive main road. Oh and while there maybe is decent food, I never found it. There are far nicer places in Scotland to live IMO.

Yorkshire.
Expected more varied/interesting landscape but surprised at how flat a lot of it was and not all that bucolic. Very overrated.

Admit it. You went to Selby and Doncaster didn't you?

Most places seem to divide into nice places to live OR visit and a few doubtless have no endearing features at all.

I live in Woking which is unremarkable in every way... but its a decent place to live and within 30 minutes of Surrey Hills or Swinley and should you wish or be required only 20 mins by train to London.

London has to top the bill as disappointing for me though.
Not really because of the well known negatives but because when you live and work there its so much effort to get out and also you never seem to have time to do the stuff that is "good" about it...

DaveyBoyWonder - Member
Yorkshire.
Expected more varied/interesting landscape but surprised at how flat a lot of it was and not all that bucolic. Very overrated.
Admit it. You went to Selby and Doncaster didn't you?

In his defence it covers everywhere east of the a1 pretty much.

Madame Tussaud...a baffling disappointment.

You lot have failed to set your expectations sufficiently low.

Stone henge

That's a good shout. It'd probably be pretty cool if you could get near the bloody thing, rather then viewing it though a wire mesh fence from fifty yards away.

The Tower of London was another expensive mistake.

Big Ben......I remember thinking it's not very well...."Big"
😆

In his defence it covers everywhere east of the a1 pretty much.

Your're right. Don't bother, nothing to see.

Agree about Llanberis, for a town at the foot of the most popular mountain in Southern Britain it spectacularly under-delivers, a couple of desultory pubs and pete's eats clearly trading on former 'glory'

The whole of Cornwall.

[quote=dragon ]Aviemore for me is on the list because its ugly, busy, and right next to a massive main road. Oh and while there maybe is decent food, I never found it. There are far nicer places in Scotland to live IMO.

Ah - I was about to ask why it "disappointed" you 0 genuinely interested as it's good to hear opinions. I guess that, like many places on this list (Cornwall? Really?) it depends on your expectations.

It's certainly true that, when we were looking to move north, Aviemore wasn't originally on our short list, despite the fact we've holidayed and visited here for decades. We were considering West Coast villages with a sea view. Then reality bites and you realise that, while it's lovely living 15 miles along a single-track road, there are no jobs, no pubs and it's a one-hour+ trip to get a pint of milk 🙂

I guess there's something good about it - that's what makes it "busy" (for a certain definition of busy I'm barely familiar with). If you haven't found decent food in and around Aviemore then you're plainly visiting the wrong establishments.

There are worse places than Skipton.
Apparently most of Britain.
http://www.cravenherald.co.uk/news/14343141.Skipton_basks_in__best_places_to_live_in_UK__glory/

http://www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/2014/03/16/best-place-to-live_n_4973713.html

Bit rich criticizing Aviemore because it's next to a main road . When you are there you wouldn't even know the A9 was close . If it ran through the centre of town then I would agree but it doesn't . I thought that having good road and rail links was a good thing . 20 years ago it seemed pretty tired but it seems to have made big improvements since then .

[quote=Ramsey Neil ]I thought that having good road and rail links was a good thing . That's what makes it busy I guess. If it had neither it would surely be a lot quieter. Of course it would then have fewer shops, pubs, hotels, restaurants etc. Hence my question about expectations - e.g. I've been to Cornwall and it was almost exactly as I'd expected it to be so it wasn't a disappointment

Swinley Forest 😛

deadkenny - Member
Swinley Forest

POSTED 23 MINUTES AGO # REPORT-POST

Ah that's 'cos you were going around it in under an hour.....if you'd taken your time to enjoy it.......

There are worse places than Skipton.

I agree but establishing the worst places was the point of the other thread. This ones about towns that are a bit of a let down and don't quite deliver in the way you might expect them to!

I will also stick up for Skipton. Granted, if you turn up on a wet Tuesday in December it can be as bleak as anywhere else but it's a lovely place to live and a safe place to bring up children. I have no desire to leave. Actually, it's horrible so all you tourists feel free to not come here and block up everywhere