Towering complaints: Recent travellers expressed concern about the lack of social distancing and safeguards. Photo / File
Towering complaints: Recent travellers expressed concern about the lack of social distancing and safeguards. Photo / File
The Eiffel Tower is one of the most visited attraction in one of the most visited cities in the world.
And while it's won plenty of fans, it's also attracted more than a few critics.
The iconic Paris landmark has been named the world's most complained about tourist attraction by UK comparison site Uswitch.
The site analysed complaints left by tourists on the travel site TripAdvisor to come up the average time visitors spent writing negative reviews about major attractions.
According to Uswitch's formula, people spent 24,129 minutes writing 19,303 negative reviews for the Eiffel Tower, Travel and Leisure reported.
Rome's Colosseum, the Big Ben in London, the Pyramids of Giza, New York's Statue of Liberty, the Hollywood sign in Los Angeles, India's Taj Mahal, the Berlin Wall, the Grand Canyon's South Rim and our very own Sydney Opera House also made the list.
Berlin's wall divided a lot of tourists, as one of the world's most complained about attractions. Photo / Doukan Sahin, Unsplash
However, as these are some of the most visited tourist attractions in the world, it's understandable there would be a large volume of complaints alongside more positive reviews.
Still, Paris tourists were scathing in their frustration with the Eiffel Tower on TripAdvisor.
"The area is so so dirty, filled with rats," one visitor said, while also taking aim at street vendors who sell products to tourists in the area.
"I got stopped by 2 of them and they started to make a bracelet right on my hand. I didn't understand anything until they finished and I was asked for 20 euros each.
"They should definitely put security and police around here. The lights of the tower go off at 1am, you can't even enjoy or admire this iconic place."
Another dismissed the iconic structure as a "big hunk of steel". "Nothing special, too commercial," they said.
More recent travellers expressed concern about the lack of social distancing and COVID-safe guidelines on Eiffel Tower tours.
The Sydney Opera House had relatively fewer complaints on TripAdvisor than the other attractions (just 299 compared to the Eiffel Tower's 19,303) but some unhappy visitors were scathing.
"Took guided tour for $42 … waste of time and money," a reviewer who visited Sydney in February said. "We were shown one concert hall, private dining venues, public areas, and the basement. No pics allowed. I'm a world traveller, worst tour I've ever taken."
Kinda great: China's Great wall was the areas most underwhelming attraction, according to the survey. Photo / Unsplash, Avery Steadman
Others complained about the stairs at the opera house, the huge crowds at (pre-pandemic) showtimes, and the "nasty food".
Last year, a different analysis of TripAdvisor reviews determined the Hollywood Walk of Fame to be the most overrated tourist attraction in the world, with critics branding it "crowded with tourists, scammers, homeless, creeps & weirdos" and saying it should be "at the bottom of your 'things to do' list in LA".
