The capital cities. If you want authentic Europe, find the weird local festivals where people chase cheese down a hill or celebrate local culture or something. That’s real Europe. Fuck the big cities and their galleries and museums.
https://www.egremontcrabfair.com/
https://airguitarworldchampionships.com/en/home/
https://www.latomatinatours.com/
https://www.theshed.co.uk/independent
https://cipc.pipeclubs.com/events/british-pipe-smoking-championship-2/
https://www.visitvoss.no/en/smalahovetunet
https://www.sbf.se/sportgrenar/folkrace
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vinkensport
https://eukonkanto.fi/en/front-page/
https://www.gloucestershirelive.co.uk/news/cheltenham-news/man-shatters-toes-winning-world-8977482
These are a few things off the top of my head mostly northern and western Europe because it’s what I’m familiar with. Also if you want to see something bizarre, go to Finland on free bucket day. But seriously Europe is full of unusual things to do. Or you could go to yet another gallery and pretend to be interested in paintings.
Eastern Ukraine isn’t an ideal tourist spot at the moment.
But the minefields are a banger scnr
The internet has broken my brain.
scnr is a new one on me and in an attempt to figure it out, my brain did not land on the now rather obvious “sorry, could not resist” but “skibidi cap no rizz” as some kind of ironic initialism
I’m gonna go and find some grass now
skibidi cap no rizz
our brains are mush fr 😭
I read it as scenario ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
I read it as scenery. Probably because the thread is about travel.
“smoke copium, non-resident”?
I only git as far as SNCF, the French railway company. Just a transposition and a single pen stroke away.
git commit -m “Zoomer/alpha humor acronym database extended with new entry for scnr”
Russia in general also.
As a European from elsewhere in Europe, I’m never going back to Milan. Maybe it’s fine if you’re into fashion, but if you’re not there’s not much to look at except a cathedral which resembles every other cathedral, and it’s impossible to get a photo of it without also having a friendship bracelet scammer in the frame, actively harassing you.
All tourist locations in Italy and France have people trying to scam you (and some non-scammers just trying to sell you cheap toys), but Milan is the only place I’ve been to where they’re straight up harassing you non-stop. Go to Pisa instead, it’s super relaxing there and you can marvel at their past mistakes in structural engineering. A far better deal.
Scammers abroad: Troll with randomness. Laugh at inappropriate times. Nod at them while making the eating food gesture. Randomly start pointing down a street like you’re trying to give directions but just shrug. Pick a random sports team name and say, “Gooooo EAGLES!” while nodding and dancing. Basically pick some random thing, pretend they said it, and you’re going along with it.
If they’re pointing to friendship braclets, you say “9 o’clock.” even though it’s 1:30. If they keep doing it, you just laugh, nod, and clap.
My favourite is pretending I’m deaf and making up signing. When they start gesturing, I repeat the gesture in shock. When they nod, I act disgusted like they’re sick in the head.
They will very quickly move on since you’re a waste of time. The more awkward you make it, the better, especially if you’re drawing looks from others.
I’ve used very similar techniques on men in bars who don’t think no is a complete sentence.
I’m well past the age for shame. I will make a fool of myself if it means some twerp will think twice about harassing a woman who’s repeatedly turned them down
I’d never considered doing the same for scammers - great idea! I’m just overly polite and that makes me seem like a target I think.
I have personally yelled, “Fuck off! No means no you fucking creep!” at the top of my lungs in a crowded bar. It was genuine, but over the top so every other person would turn and see them, ruining their chances of “picking up” at that establishment, forcing them to leave.
“Are you okay?”
“Oh, yeah I’m fine. That guy just needed to learn a fucking lesson.”
That is hilarious but too much effort. A simple ‘Fuck off’ should suffice.
That does work too, but not on the ones that put shit on you and demand payment, usually operating as 2+. Their tactic is intimidation and drama—playing the victim to you—but it can not be beaten if you’re playing the role of a happy idiot, providing random or exact opposite behaviour to what they’re attempting.
One of these guys walked up and gave me a handful of birdseed, prompting a flock of pigeons to come perch on my arms. I most certainly did not hand over the money they wanted for the experience I didn’t ask for and was somewhat disgusted by.
I’d imagine stealing your passport or wallet would be the real goal there.
I just don’t engage. You don’t have to talk back and they get the hint rather quickly that there are more rubes nearby.
Pisa is bad too, it is just the tower and crazy tourist prices.
How about Venice?
Venice kind of has a Disneyland vibe.
There aren’t any scammers, the place is filled with history, and is relatively well kept and run. The flip side to it is that feels like a theme park at times.
It also has Disneyland prices.
I was in Venice pre-covid. I spent a day walking around and soaking in the sights and sounds. Sat by myself for an hour listening to some guy play the chello. It was beautiful. Never got harassed by street peddlers or scammers unlike in Milan. The architecture was beautiful like nothing else. Its a city trapped in the Renaissance era.
Terrible, not a real city, like the other person said, feels more like a theme park for tourists. Already did 20 years ago, last time i’ve been, never going back.
Pisa has a few other places, but you can see the city in a day and not miss anything.
We were in the mood for a chill day, so it was nice to just chill in a park and walk through some random old neighborhoods until we stumbled across a restaurant. There’s nothing chill about Milan, though, at least not where a clueless tourist would find it.
Funny you should say that; I went to Florence some years back and we took a day trip to Pisa and had to deal with the worst, most aggressive scammers I’ve ever experienced.
We may have just gotten lucky. I also had a great time in Venice once by wandering off randomly and ending up somewhere I can only assume tourists don’t normally go. We bought some fruit off a boat which was both delicious and very affordable, so I assume the target demographic was not tourists. I’m pretty sure that’s not the universal experience of Venice either.
I liked the middle finger statue
I really enjoyed visiting Cimiteiro Monumentale in Milan. A historic cemetery with lots of lavishishly designed huge tombs. Very few tourists there and no scammers whatsoever.
Canary Islands. Great place, but the mass tourism is actually killing them, provoking skyrocketing rent and shortages of power and water.
Indeed. My girlfriend lives there, last time I was over we went to the big demonstration against mass tourism. I felt a bit sick at the airport listening to all the north European pensioners talking about how they rent a place year round for 800€/month just to spend the odd week now and then there. While many locals working in tourism make minimum wage, around 1300€/month I believe.
Hey that’s exactly what my rent / wage split was in the UK last year. The only reason anything got better is that minimum wage went up while my rent hasn’t yet.
Removed by mod
how is rent related to tourism?
Airbnbs/rentals drive up the cost of housing.
They should just make short renting of apartments illegal.
Think about it for a second, no, half a second and see if anything occurs to you.
I assume because demand outstrips supply, the “value” of the rental units is inflated and landlords can charge more, pricing out locals
Had a couch surfer stay with us a while in Kuwait. He’d been everywhere. He said that, of all places, Moldova had no redeeming qualities. Granted, things might have changed in 10 years. Does anyone care to weigh in?
Here’s what I would avoid when traveling to Poland:
- Zakopane, it’s overpriced and very crowded. If you want to visit the area the town is in your better off staying in smaller villages, unless you have to use public transit.
- Szczecin --not an ‘avoid at all cost’ but more of a ‘there are better cities to visit’-- this-or-that part of the city is always being remodeled/reconstructed and there’s no ‘old city’ with day and night life focused between two shoping centers and some roundabouts in the city center. If you want to go sight-seeing Kraków, Wrocław or Gdańsk are much better choices.
- Mazury lake district, beautiful lakes and decent nightlife, shit infrastructure - roads are narrow (two bigger cars can’t pass eachother without going offroad) and often lacking sings and other markings
- Podlaskie Voivodship, even worse infrastructure than Mazury, it’s rural, mainly towns and villages with nothing a tourist might want to see. You might think it’s a good place to go star-gazing but Bieszczady are a lot better for that (Tho you should probably go to a Dark Sky Site for that, there’s one close to Bieszczady, in Slovakia)
- THE SEASIDE, it’s crowded, expensive, the sea is cold and it’s fumcking wimdy, go to like Italy, Croatia, Portugal or Spain instead
Also in general avoid capital cities, they are often the worst of major cites in a given country.
Dublin is a kip, you have far better options throughout Ireland, if you want a city go to Cork or Belfast. Galway is a bit boring to me but could be your scene. After that there are loads of little spots with loads going for them. The entire west coast is great.
Dont rent a big car, I mean big by irish sandards.
Berlin
Andorra. Full of motor bozos, duty free shops, terrible cities in the valleys. A tax haven joke country. Nice mountains i guess.
Hey! I will not tolerate this kind of racism against influencers! /s
What’s a motor bozo?
It is a machine that converts electrical energy into mechanical energy and stop calling me Bozo.
The tax criminals / profiteurs of tax criminality driving their loud fancy sports cars through the andorran valleys and up to the golf courts.
That’s the same in San Marino. It’s nice but come on, it’s full of duty free shops and shops that sell arms that are illegal in Italy
Passed through earlier this year specifically to visit Caldea mineral springs. Absolutely worth it if you’re nearby.
Common tourist places during tourist season are usually the worst. I took a 10 day trip to Paris one summer and it was a mix of the most popular tourist places (Louvre, Eiffel tower, etc) and some underground shit my sister found.
Every tourist place was jam packed with annoying tourists, costly and had tons of scammers surrounding it. Every less known place was really awesome, aside from one sketchy neighborhood we had to walk through where we were followed for a while.
I’d also say that Northern Europe has generally been much more pleasant to travel through, for me.
Switzerland. If you’ve got buckets of money it’s fine but donair can easily run you 18 francs and a real meal will cost you 100+. I’ve visited twice and both times the extreme costs involved have hamstrung my ability to actually enjoy things. The trains and geography are amazing - but the streets full of jewelers and high fashion specifically targeting millionaires or up are an awful example of late stage capitalism.
Sorry but you’re exaggerating, a full meal including drinks in a mid-level establishment will be at max. 50 chf and that’s being generous. And with cheaper places you can even stay below 20 chf.
Yes, Switzerland is expensive but there’s no need to lie about it. Also the stuff about millionaires and all maybe fits a couple streets in Switzerland that are very touristy but there are plenty of places not at all like this.
Donair? What’s that? Fancy Doner Kebab made with Don Perignon and air?
My first experience with this food was in Halifax decades ago. The Halifax Donair is a unique thing.
And it’s definitely Donair, not Doner.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Donair
Interesting. The creation has a Wikipedia page.
Funny enough you are legally not allowed to call that a Döner in the EU. (Döner by law must not use ground beef. If they do you can call them Kebab,but not Döner)
y’all are missing out on the kapsalon
It’s the French transliteration. Doner would be pronounced “donay”.
A full meal including drinks will usually run 50 chf per person if you’re a couple most meals will run 100+ - it is possible to eat on a budget (we’ve usually relied on sausage stands and donair). And yea, I’m mostly talking about what you’ll find in Lucerne, Zurich, or Geneva where you’re likely to visit.
I don‘t know where you‘re eating lol. A döner in zurich is about 14-15 francs at the moment never seen one for 18 francs and they increased prices the last two years as well.
If you‘re having a meal and drinks for 50 francs per person you have likely been to a fancy restaurant. Don‘t get me wrong, it absolutely is possible to easily go over 50 francs, however its also is very easy to stay below that and still have a good experience.
I’ve visited multiple times with a camper, and if you use apps like park for night to find free or cheap places to stay!then buy your own ingredients to cook, it’s actually really acceptable. And the nature is gorgeous!
Same for me, with a bicycle and tent. Camp sites are also ok priced, at least for cyclists. Very much enjoy cycling in switzerland, i also think people are friendly. I used to have different experiences but those were just single persons / crazy people or something.
I live in switzerland and my lunch costs CHF 2.50 so I don’t know where you’ve been eating for one hundred + francs for a ‘real meal’.
How did you get a 2.50CHF lunch? Migro prepacked sandwich?
I always struggle to find cheap lunch options.
Coop Prix Guarantie CousCous salad.
I paid 20€ for a Pizza Margherita in Oslo once. In some very rich places you can feel like a tourist from a developing country even if you are from a less-rich high-income country yourself.
donair can easily run you 18 francs and a real meal will cost you 100+.
What the fuck…??? 😲
Well it’s simply not true, doeners are 10-15, and meals in sitdown restaurants are 12-25. I live in Zurich, restaurants are slightly cheaper than in the US ( plus there is no tip or extra tax, what you see on the menu is what you pay) - but there are less budget options available.
France is becoming a far right country on two weeks. Do yourself a favor and stay as far as you can.
I wouldn’t say at all cost, but Montenegro isn’t fun. Russians have built massive hotel resorts on the beaches there, the locals are unhappy that they’re there so they don’t like tourists. They’ll try to fight you on the beach because you’re not local. Get hassled by the cops because you’re not local, but you’ll be able to buy your way out of your problem if you’re lucky. People don’t want to talk to you, everyone is pretty cold and borderline rude. Go to a bar for a drink and you get a glass nominally washed/rinsed in tubs of soapy water behind the bar that the previous 100 glasses went through and hasn’t been changed out. The landscape is beautiful in a hostile sort of way, but there’s just not much reason to visit. It’s not even particularly inexpensive. The hotels will try to charge you for everything, including a scuff on the wall that you didn’t do, a chip on a planter on the balcony, etc. ridiculous money grabs.
idk about the process in montenegro, but it’s pretty normal in america for bars to use a three compartment sink with a christmas tree scrub brush stuck to the bottom of the first sink, which is filled about half full with soapy water, a rinse water mixture in the next one and a sanitizer water mixture in the last one.
it’s a fast and safe way to do dishes by hand, especially glassware if you always inspect for chips afterward (which you should be doing anyway!).
I understand there’s a right way to do it, but allow me to assure that the two murky trays behind this bar were not acceptable by any means. I didn’t want to get too graphic, but glasses went from the customer hand, a quick slosh and a rub in liquids that would make any civilized health department shriek, wiped “dry” with a filthy rag that had just wiped the bar top, filled with the next drink and handed to the next customer.
This is the kind of stuff where you see it in a movie like so: the scoundrel hero walks into a dive bar in the spaceport, orders a drink, the camera makes sure you see the pustulent, greasy alien clean the vessel using the above process. The alien pours a questionable liquid into it, and slides it to the observing hero who has been keeping a stone-faced expression but for a hint of discomposure as he receives the drink. After the briefest pause in frame to let you know he questions what he is about to do, he downs the beverage. You can’t help but cringe along with the hero and think licking the alien might have been safer.
(Am not comparing or suggesting Montenegrins are in any way shape or form like the hypothetical alien)
That gave such Space Quest vibes and I’m here for it. Just needs the narrator: “Don’t lick that! It doesn’t know where you’ve been!” Lol
Places where you only order highballs due to health concerns ftw.
Paris, it’s the WORST city in all of France.
Yes, please don’t come to Paris. It’s crowded enough as it is. Also we’re all very rude.
I once had a French co-worker tell me that the rest of France would divorce you if they could.
Paris is 80% people from the rest of the country. Which their former neighbours promply hate as soon as they move there.
It’s traditional.
From what my former Parisian grad school housemate told me, I concur. He once said in reply to a friend (named Roger) asking him why people in Paris were mean to him and hate Americans, my housemate replied, “Oh Rogers, zhee French do not hate Americans, zhey hate EVERYONE, especially zhee other French”. My experience in Paris was that the Parisians were surprisingly friendly. But I speak a little French and say Bonjour and Merci when warranted.
My experiences in Rocket League can confirm. People being toxic in chat? Tell them something in chat back – get the “tg” to confirm French. Every goddamn time, always the French that are so rude.
Why? Why are they having such a bad day every day? Play a game to have fun ffs.
Not to hijack a thread, but what does lemmy consider the BEST place in France? I’d like suggestions.
Toulouse is a pretty laid back larger city that is beautiful without being overly touristy
Lyon. 3rd sized city. Best food of France. 2 rivers. centre of France so close to anything. should have been the capital of France if the kid of one king didn’t die there for some reason, or whatever
Lyon is pretty great. Depending on the vibe you’re going for, Marseille is also pretty awesome. I’d avoid it in the middle of the summer, but shoulder season down south is amazing. The weather is great, the people are friendly (if you avoid the worst parts of town, like anywhere) and the food is a nice mix of traditional French and Mediterranean cuisine. And make sure to get a flight of Ricard.
Please don’t hate me: Paris, really.
Bretagne
If you want to stay in Germany and hop across the border, Strasbourg and Colmar are both nice towns. Has German influence but you get the benefits of being near the black forest for a 2 for 1 trip.
the south, I’m told.
La Rochelle, Nantes are both nice from my experience.
Most places in the south
I really liked Paris 🥲 I did go during the end of October though, so that might’ve have been a factor. People still didn’t want to talk to me in French, but they weren’t rude about it.
My favourite place to visit in France was La Rochelle, I feel like I got most of the benefits of visiting Coastal France but without the Marseille/Toulon/Monaco crowds (yes I know, Monaco is not France).
I’ve been to Paris 3 times, I’m from BC in Canada. April, May and October I went. Had an amazing time every time, people, food, places. It’s one of my favorite cities.
I also liked Paris and I’ve been there twice in summer. People weren’t actively going out of their way to be unfriendly to us, so this was great compared to the rest of france.
Everyone we asked for help did their best to help us, though we have 0 french knowledge. I had very different experiences elsewhere in France (we quickly learned to only speak to arab people outside Paris, if we needed help, worked fine).
We skipped most touristy places and just had a few relaxing days there both times. So that might also be, why we had a pleasant time in Paris.
“Nobody goes there, it’s too crowded”
Correct, it’s the worst most popular place
Done. I’ve been on vacation in France many times, visited many regions and provinces. Never been to Paris.
As others said Switzerland. It’s beautiful and all but really expensive. It really took away a big part of fun when I went there. But not only that, I thought the swiss people seemed sometimes kinda "rude"or maybe a better word for it “cold” and a little annoyed if it came to tourists. I get it, it’s a small county and a lot of people are visiting each year, but it still wasn’t fun for me to be there and I wouldn’t recommend it to anyone to go there.
And North France near the German border like Strasbourg. The city and the region is beautiful as well, but the people are often like the cliché everybody knows and that sucks if you’re a tourist. But the south of France like Marseille and the Provence is always worth a visit. The people are chill, enjoying life in the typical mediterranean way and are often friendlier (and often speak English at least in the bigger cities/tourist areas).
I thought the swiss people seemed sometimes kinda "rude"or maybe a better word for it “cold” and a little annoyed
I have some Swiss-American relatives, and I think this is cultural. They just have a different set of indicators, they’re not going to be grinning and hugging.
As a counter example, I managed to make friends with a Swiss person while elsewhere in Europe, and then later in my travels got to visit them in Switzerland for a few days. My time there was truly one of the most breathtaking and memorable experiences of my trip.
Maybe it’s expensive, maybe Europeans are “cold” personality wise, but God damn they have got some incredible scenery.
As an Anglophone who lives in France, I agree. Although where I live (east / south-east) English is not very widely spoken, even in bigger cities, but the people are generally very friendly.
cold
This is my experience with Europeans in general tbh
So knowing that European consider Swiss people cold, imagine how cold they are.
They are stone cold to foreigners - so many English speaking wealthy people live there and they are not welcomed into the local communities. It can take a decade to make local Swiss friends.
Then you should visit south europe. Europe is divided by the alps in a lot of things, like potato or tomato as main ingredient in meals. But also in culture itself. Everything north of the alps is kinda cold and seems unhappy/angry and stressed all the time and south of it people seem chill, happy and friendly.
…but it all goes wrong again at the south coast. Even the locals leave for the summer.
