The world's most overrated tourist attractions

As we’ve discovered from trawling TripAdvisor for hilariously grumpy one-star reviews, one traveller’s bucket list experience is another’s total waste of time and money. Stonehenge has been dismissed as “just a bunch of rocks”, the Sagrada Familia described as a “monstrosity”, and the Grand Canyon summed up with the succinct review: “It’s nothing special”.

Now the users of Reddit have offered their thoughts on some supposedly “must-see” attractions in the US and beyond. Their replies to the question: “What is NOT worth seeing in person?” will make you think twice next time you’re planning a “once-in-a-lifetime” trip.

US attractions

Four Corners Monument

“I remember reading about it as a kid and convincing my family to drive out of the way to go see it on a road trip. It is literally a concrete slab in the middle of nowhere. My dad and I still use this as a reference about how disappointing things are (‘as bad as Four Corners?’) 25 years later.”

“It's a monument to property lines in the middle of nowhere.”

“The most disappointing monument I've ever been to.”

The Corn Palace

“My family followed it up by going to the Spam Museum.”

Iowa's Largest Frying Pan

“It wasn't nearly as large as I thought it would be. I guess I have standards for large frying pans.”

“Looking at it you know it couldn't function as a frying pan. Like if you found a giant stove or something. It's so thin relative to its size.”

“NC has a better one they use every year to deep fry 30 chickens at a time.”

Plymouth Rock

“A rock in the sand that people stand around and look at.”

“My seventh grade class was taking a trip to Boston and for weeks my teachers had been hyping up this rock. They would say how incredible and deeply touching it was to see a piece of history like that up close. Then we saw it. Every single one of us had this shocked look on our faces until the teachers all burst into laughter because their ruse had worked.”

“I love that it's just a big pet rock. It's got its own cage and everything.”

“I have friends in Plymouth. They told me over the years so many people have broken off pieces of the rock as a souvenir that they had to get a new rock. It's not even the original rock anymore.”

The Liberty Bell

“It's a bell with a crack in it.”

Top deck of the Empire State Building

“Look at it from the outside.”

“Not worth the money.”

Hollywood Boulevard

“My heart sinks when I have to go there for any reason. Tourists are constantly stopping in the middle of the sidewalk to take a picture of one of the Walk of Fame stars. Every souvenir shop is exactly the same. Food and drink is expensive because the prices are marked up for tourists.”

Salem

“Too many hipsters and wannabe ‘witches’ roaming the streets blocking traffic, taking pictures, and just generally being rude. Salem has history, just stay away.”

The Alamo

“It is pretty underwhelming and there's a ton of super tacky tourist trap shops, like a Ripley's, right across from it.”

Niagara Falls

“The whole experience is a bit disappointing.”

Mount Rushmore

“After a few minutes the novelty wears off and that's when you realise you've travelled to the middle of nowhere in South Dakota just to see a big rock that looks a lot smaller in person.”

Times Square on New Year’s Eve

“You can barely move for hours and there's no place to go to the bathroom.”

“It's NYC. Just go to the bathroom wherever you want.”

“Times Square at basically any time of the day is pretty unbearable.”

New York in the winter

“Slush and concentrated gale force wind.”

“Not as magical as those beautiful pictures make it out to be.”

Rest of the world

The Leaning Tower of Pisa

“It's just a tower that's leaning.”

“Oh, it really leans. Remarkable.”

The Great Wall of China

“Lots of tourists and touristy crap. Unless you're big into history, it's just a lot of stairs and uneven ground that's a pain to walk on.”

The Sphinx

“It's much smaller than I expected and is so damaged that the face is almost gone.”

The Mona Lisa

“About the size of a piece of printer paper, and you already know what it looks like.”

“It's ridiculously small. And you can't even get close to it because there's always a huge mob of people.”

The Australian Outback

“Heat and snakes… and if something goes wrong you WILL die. You might even die without anything going wrong.”

The Little Mermaid statue, Copenhagen

“We took a tour boat and briefly passed the statue for a few seconds. No part of me felt the need to stop and look at it for more than five seconds.”

Hobbiton, New Zealand

“You're being ripped off to stand in a field with some fake building fronts. As somebody who loves and respects our tourism industry, spend your money on something worthwhile.”

The Blarney Stone

“It's a ******* rock.”

Abbey Road, London

“No-one stops for it anymore because it's littered with non stop tourists posing for pictures and blocking traffic.”

The Manneken Pis, Brussels

“It's tiny, slightly out of the way, and it's just a recreation. The original has been stolen so many times that you're seeing a recreation of a recreation.”

Bruges

“Unless you're into canals and alcoves.”