I live in Birmingham, Alabama. I like when people visit with a preconceived idea of what the South is like and then they find out how wrong they are.
I have traveled a fair amount and I have always been impressed with how polite and accomodating locals can be.
Some of my experiences:
London–absolutely wonderful. The locals I met were helpful, polite, generous and kind. Plus, they loved to hear me talk with my Southern accent. I would move to London in a heartbeat if the opportunity ever came up.
Paris–not so much. The locals I came into contact with were not at all friendly. I speak limited French and I had several bad experiences while in shops or restaurants with the owners or staff acting as if I wasn’t worth their time. I’m sure there are great and wonderful people in France and when I go back I’m sure I’ll run into some of them.
Chicago–very hospitable, friendly, helpful people. Of course it was Dopers I was hanging around with so maybe I’m biased.
Washington DC–very friendly people. I met several locals who were quite helpful as I came down ill while there and had no idea where a near by doctor was or a pharmacy. I met some really nice people.
Indy 500 time–The tourists aren’t too bad. Some are kinda backwards-redneck types, but most are just regular people looking to party and have a good time. It’s nice to meet some foreigners as well.
Brickyard 400 time–No thanks. They can go back to wherever they came from. Rude, obnoxious, and they don’t spend nearly as much money as the 500 crowd.
Formula 1 time–New to us in the last few years so it’s hard to say. I will tell you this: I have no problem with the hottie European men it brings.
Otherwise we don’t get a lot of tourists that I notice. Maybe some for basketball or something, but I tend to stay away from downtown during sports.
Well, I live 20 minutes outside downtown Orlando. MAJOR tourist destination (as well as some prime locations for those retiring here). Not only do they visit The Mouse, SeaWorld and other theme parks, but also visit retired relatives all over the State, Kennedy Space Center, all the beaches, the Daytona 500 annually, NBA and NFL games, golf tournaments, and numerous festivals.
I agree with what’s been said about other tourist locations…spend lots of money, leave soon (and don’t move here when you retire, please (unless you’re not going to drive while here), traffic is bad enough already!)!
Well, since I am in Conde Nast’s “Number One Tourist Destination City in the Americas” (2003), and the over 3 million annual visitors to Vancouver Island (that’s the Island, not the City!) bring in well in excess of a billion dollars a year to the economy, I for one welcome our Bermuda-shorts-wearing overlords.
The salmon are vanishing, the lumber industry is flatlining, shipbuilding died 30 years ago…tourism is our biggest moneymaker (next to BC Bud, of course).
The only visitors who annoy me are the swarms who rent those little scooters and travel in packs, swerving all over the road and beeping those pathetic horns constantly. Very aggravating, and dangerous for all concerned.
Having lived a variety of places but now in New Orleans, I must say that except around Mardi Gras season (when the drunk tourists block the freeways so those of us who really DO need to move over so we can cross the bridge to get home don’t appreciate getting the finger when we try to move over, thank you very much), tourists here are lots of fun. It’s great fun to make suggestions to them on places to see and things to do, some of which they often didn’t know about.
Before this I was in the DC area, worked right downtown on Pennsylvania Avenue, and tourists were even more fun (except when they’d stand on the left on the Metro escalators – but I learned to bark at them to move with enough authority that they’d not only move but look guilty in the process ). One day riding in to work on the Metro, I met up with a bunch of teachers who were in town from around the country with high school kids, and were playing hooky from their kids for the day. They invited me to join them, and I’m still regretting I didn’t; they were a fun bunch!
I’ve been a tourist enough places myself to appreciate a kind word, so I always try to do the same. My fondest memories are often of the locals I’ve met hither and yon; that’s what makes travel the most fun. So I try to be someone the tourists to my city remember, too, with good thoughts.
When I lived in Key West I saw more than one bumper sticker that read, “If it’s season, why can’t we shoot them?”
It could be overwhelming at times, just because the island is so small. I think the locals understood that tourists kept them in jobs, but still, I understood the sentiment of the bumper sticker.
I’ve lived in El Paso for 19 years (more or less), and in my experience the only “tourists” we get are people who are:
Seeing the sights while visiting family or friends.
Here for a convention.
Stranded.
Only here because they want to go shopping/drinking in Mexico.
We’ve got some interesting local history and have the potential to rival Santa Fe and San Antonio in tourism, but this city is just too apathetic to make the effort.
Sorry…I moved to New Orleans from Augusta almost a year and a half ago. It’s a nice town in a lot of ways, but for a lot more ways you couldn’t pay me to go back. Suffice it to say that I am not conservative. Augusta is.
I’m usually okay with tourists. This is a place people come to specifically to have a good time, and this is an area that depends heavily on tourism. So, there are a lot of happy tourists.
Most of the tourists here are folks who show up in early November in a Winnebago with Minnesota license plates.
We call them ‘snowbirds.’
I don’t have much of a problem, except that traffic here is much worse in winter 'cause of all the northerners looking to eacape the snow.
I’ve been told (although I don’t know how true it is) that the population of Tucson in summer is half of what it is in winter. That’s because of all the students plus the snowbirds.
And any sane person would get out of here in the summer. It’s mighty hot.
I like tourists, they are usually very friendly and very interested in the country.
That said I can relate to the OP a bit. Most people come to NZ to look at scenery, do some extreme sport or find Middle Earth. They nearly always fly into and out of Auckland. Some have a wee look round but most head straight off to the South Island. It would be quite nice if they stopped telling us that the rest of NZ is wayyyyyyyyyy better then Auckland. It isn’t better it’s just different.
I don’t have any problems with tourists, so I guess if I ever meet one in my hometown I’ll be helpful and give him directions to wherever it was he planned on going to.
Which goes well with NH’s unofficial state motto GO AWAY AND LEAVE US THE HELL ALONE.
I hate tourists. Well, tourists besides the skiers, but I only like them since they’re foolish with money and have a lot of it. Tourist season in the summer means that gas prices skyrocket and there’s a vast increase of clueless frightened drivers who have never seen a traffic circle before. :rolleyes: And what’s with all the people with FL plates driving 15 under the speed limit? It seems as though it’d take them 4 months to get here at the speed they go… Then in the fall you have all the wide-eyed people looking at the leaves. Leaves! Tourists? No sir, I don’t like 'em.
SF Bay Area here…
I’m of two minds about our tourists. The people who come to sight see, honeymoon, vacation…they’re great. I never mind giving directions, suggestions for a good restaurant or point out something beyond the obvious tourist traps. The BUSINESS travellers on the other hand…they seem to resent the fact that they are stuck here in this godawful hellhole (one visitor’s description :rolleyes: ) and can’t wait to leave. To them I say: “Good riddance! Don’t let the door hit ya!”
I’m all for tourists in New York City. It’s nice because even though there are a lot of tourists, there are also a lot of New Yorkers and a lot of business visitors, so the tourists never reach critical mass. I know that sometimes people complain that tourists do things that are annoying to the natives, like stop dead in their tracks at the top of the subway stairs to consult a map, but believe me, I have seen native NYers make that same stupid stop to make a call on their cell phones. That is even more annoying because THEY SHOULD KNOW BETTER.
I am also a direction-giving magnet. Tourists somehow seek me out from a hundred paces and ask me for directions at least once a day, often more. I think it is because I a. look like I know where I’m going, and b. don’t look threatening (I’m a short, plump woman who is usually wearing office casual). I give out directions, subway advice, estimates for cab fare, and restaurant and bar recommendations.
Another cool thing about my own personal tourists (when we have friends in, or are entertaining people from out-of-town at the office) is that I actually go do touristy stuff. I’m one of those NYers who would never otherwise set foot on the Circle Line, wait to go to the top of the Empire State Building or go see the tree in Rockefeller Center. And those are all fun things to do! Having tourists is a good way to keep seeing the city.
My hometown, Buffalo, doesn’t have tourists of which I am aware.
Being a native of Cleveland Ohio, the concept of people visiting there was laughable for many years - hell, they couldn’t even keep people LIVING there. Now, with downtown cleaned up, a river which is no longer a fire hazard, decent nightlife, the Rock and Roll Hall Of Fame, etc., there really is tourism now. I think most any Clevelander is grateful at this point.
Your sentiments must be widely shared - I have never visited a place with nicer, more civilized people than Victoria BC. They even stop for you if you utilize a crosswalk nowhere near an intersection. I’d move there in a heartbeat, but my wife needs more sunshine.
Well, no, actually it really is better. (IMHO of course.) The South Island offers attractions which are hard to find anywhere else in the world. Auckland, while a nice city, is a city nonetheless.
The number of tourists visiting Sydney has definitely increased over the past 20 years. The first big increase occurred during the Bicentennary in 1988 and there was a further surge during and after the Olympic Games in 2000. Even so, tourist numbers are nothing like those experienced in other cities such as New York, London or Paris.
On the whole tourists don’t bother me and their presence is clearly great for the economy. I always try to help the ones who are a standing on street corners looking a bit “lost”.
However I do find it a bit irritating when tourists express surprise and imply “error” about basic Australian realities e.g.
so many people speak English
we drive on the “wrong” (never the “opposite” or the “other” side) of the road
we have “weird” seasons with Christmas in the middle of summer
Australian time zones are ahead of those in the USA etc.
A sneering, condescending superiority complex, and an insistence that any city that isn’t Dallas isn’t worth his time… :rolleyes:
Whiterabbit, I can’t wait to visit New Orleans. Everyone I know who has been there has nothing but great things to say about it. But, I think I’ll do it after Fat Tuesday.
My favorite time to be in the French Quarter was Halloween, usally just locals all dressed up and having a blast. Plus the weather is cool and that makes the Quarter not smell too bad.
Well I had to leave New Orleans, there was not a big calling for my line of work. I miss the music, food and Jazz Fest. I still have lots of familt there so I get back every now and then. Augusta is okay, not a great place to be single. Broad street is adding new bars and restuarants and the local music scene is improving. We have a bluegrass bar that gets bands from all over the area. The people I hang out with are definatly not conservative, where were you going?
I would move to London in a heartbeat if the opportunity ever came up.
