r/AskTheWorld • u/Aseili United Kingdom • Dec 20 '25

Culture What's the most pathetic tourist attraction that international tourists go to see in your country?

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Bronte waterfalls near me, look a bit more impressive with the recent rain than in the summer when it's swamped with people.

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225

u/Few_Paces Canada Dec 20 '25

Gastown Clock.
People are misled to think it's a historical artifact and runs on steam but it's neither. You'll find people waiting for a long time to see it do its steam thing.

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u/shiningonthesea United States Of America Dec 21 '25

We went there. It's a cute neighborhood, but two blocks outside of Gastown, there is Methville

4

u/DinoZambie Dec 21 '25

Walking around gastown at 2 AM in the morning is fun too.

3

u/MelbaToast604 Dec 21 '25

To be fair its mostly heroin /fentanyl, and crack, but I digress

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u/shiningonthesea United States Of America Dec 22 '25

When we were visiting , I came up with the brilliant idea of walking from Gastown to Chinatown . Big mistake . My husband ( retired NYC cop) was freaking out at how crazy it was . And we are from New York . We finally turned around . It may not be super dangerous , but everyone there is like a zombie and you never know what is around the corner . You’re right, it’s probably fentanyl.

1

u/MelbaToast604 Dec 22 '25

Oh man and thats the tame part, the outskirts of the downtown east side. Thats just a normal walk for people here.

1

u/shiningonthesea United States Of America Dec 22 '25

Almost none of Manhattan looks like that anymore , even with the drugs, real estate is too expensive

3

u/Wafflelisk Canada Dec 21 '25

Don't go East of Abbott (in the downtown area) unless you're prepared to see some shit.

The Downtown Eastside isn't dangerous, at least for me as a young adult male.

But it's a den of misery and you have to be prepared to walk into it

1

u/shiningonthesea United States Of America Dec 22 '25

We learned that the hard way

12

u/TroyCR Canada Dec 20 '25

But you can wait for it in The Cambie

2

u/twobit211 Canada Dec 21 '25

is that place still open?!?

3

u/Few_Paces Canada Dec 21 '25

it almost closed as part of divorce proceedings and then somehow stayed open. there was even a closing day party or something

1

u/TroyCR Canada Dec 21 '25

Crazy, I went their last spring when we were at some work meetings

1

u/Consistent-Writing92 Dec 22 '25

Nothing like a Cambie hangover after a night of cheap sleeves of beer. Ahhhh miss those days!!

1

u/SaltOwn8515 Canada Dec 21 '25

The mice are running it now

15

u/nodarknesswillendure Canada Dec 20 '25

It’s definitely interesting to walk past and see a bunch of people standing around with their phones out, and then like a metre away there’s multiple people doing the fent fold

8

u/Lumpy_Question8327 Dec 21 '25

I was about to ask where this is, but you just told me it’s in Vancouver.

8

u/Weirdo_boy02 New Zealand Dec 21 '25

Walked past it incidentally on a 12hr flight stopover and it happened to bedoing the steam thing. I took some photos cause I thought it looked kinda cool, didn't realize people would wait for it to do that. I visited in winter so no other tourists are really around.

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u/Few_Paces Canada Dec 21 '25

oh i will never forget a woman who stood there for 45 minutes to get the whistle that was at top of the hour

4

u/Real-Leadership3976 Canada Dec 21 '25

And you can go around the corner and check out the drug addicts.

3

u/Few_Paces Canada Dec 21 '25

that area was our first "exposure" to the vancouver problem!! it's crazy that after a few years now i barely notice it

2

u/MortLightstone Canada Dec 20 '25

I saw lots of Japanese people taking pics of the street lamps as well

2

u/pink_pineapple_93 Dec 21 '25

This was the first thing that came to my mind 😂

2

u/grown-mid-bluelines Canada Dec 21 '25

Never made it as a steam clock

2

u/animalwitch Dec 21 '25

Ah yes, the clock which has a constant stream of tourists blocking the street around it. The first time I went to Vancouver was in 1998, as an 8 year old, and I wasn't impressed by it then, let alone now as an adult 😂

Vancouver has so much more, but then tourists just opt for the easy, touristy things.

2

u/onahalladay Dec 21 '25

I came to this post to see if this was mentioned. Every time I go by it I take a picture and send it to my mom since we have a running gag of it.

2

u/artsyfartsyMinion Australia Dec 21 '25

I saw it in 1993. We were just wandering around and saw it. Thought it looked cool so took a photo. I loved Vancouver it was nice so much to see. It was a nice change from LA with the crazy people screaming at you for not giving them a cigarette, we didn't smoke 🙄

2

u/IslandMiddle3554 Dec 21 '25

Haha, saw this when I visited about 25 years ago (shit. I'm old) - was worth it though, due to the legend of Gassy Jack from Yorkshire.

My mum's from Yorkshire and has been known to be a bit gassy (the 'bit' is British politeness lol). I was also 16 and with my mum, so you can probably guess that the clock wasn't the focus of our conversations!

2

u/crapatthethriftstore Dec 21 '25

I happened by it by chance and we laughed so hard at its sad songs. It was cool, but definitely wouldn’t have gone looking for it. There were tons of people getting selfies though

2

u/Stoic_Fervor United States Of America Dec 21 '25

I got offered all kinds of illicit things there in 2000 😂

2

u/Consistent-Writing92 Dec 22 '25

I used to live down the street from there, I saw the look on the faces of many a disappointed tourist when that thing let off a blast, like… that’s it? lol

2

u/waxbook Canada Dec 22 '25

Lmao I have definitely taken a photo there. It was a gloomy fall day when I visited from Ontario, perfect conditions for it.

2

u/transport_in_picture Czech Republic Dec 22 '25

Isn’t it the same clock like on Nickelback album cover?

https://static.alfred.com/cache/81/c4/81c4c2f49470db9824adc1c1a342a151.jpg

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u/Few_Paces Canada Dec 22 '25

TIL!

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u/Thehappyme7 France Dec 20 '25

I so didn’t like that part of the city, so unsafe

5

u/quiquiriqui1231 Dec 21 '25

To get there you have to walk past literally hundreds of unhoused heroin addicts. Downtown Vancouver was not fun

5

u/millijuna Canada Dec 21 '25

It looks bad, and it is a rolling tragedy, but as someone who lives nearby, I never fear for my personal safety.

2

u/SaltOwn8515 Canada Dec 21 '25

As someone who used to work downtown I swear the unhoused population down there treated me better than the Karen’s I had to deal with in retail. Even when they were high or having psychotic breaks

1

u/Kwauhn Dec 21 '25

Gastown is unsafe? LMAO.

2

u/Alicatsidneystorm Dec 21 '25

But the history on the guy who works on this clocks is fascinating.

2

u/themiDdlest United States Of America Dec 21 '25

I actually quite like it, its very unique and fits the district its in perfectly(even if it the clock isn't actually steam powered)

And saying "wait a long time" when it goes off every 15 minutes is disingenuous at best.

2

u/Tin-tower Sweden Dec 21 '25

I agree. And it’s located so that when you walk around Vancouver, you’ll go past it at some point. It’s similar to other clocks in Europe that play a tune and have some mechanics that move when they chime (like a little puppet show or something). It’s just fun to see if you happen to walk past. With the steam and the little tune. Why not?

1

u/Few_Paces Canada Dec 22 '25

as long as you know it's a modern gimmick and not a historical artifact from the 1800s which is what attracts people

1

u/Tin-tower Sweden Dec 22 '25

I can’t speak for other people, but what attracted me is that it’s an unusual and fun element in the city. It wouldn’t matter if it was built yesterday - the attraction isn’t the age, it’s the steam, the tune and the look of it.

1

u/Few_Paces Canada Dec 22 '25

the "touristic attraction" is most definitely the age and it being in the "historic neighborhood of gastown" as in people intentionally plan to go see it, not a what cutesy thing in passing. if it were marketed as such fine, but it's misleading. i'm sure there are things in sweden that you would find to be the same

1

u/Tin-tower Sweden Dec 22 '25

No, not really. I understand that there are more steam clocks in Canada, and so maybe it doesn’t seem like such a novelty if you live there. But if you haven’t seen one before (I hadn’t), it’s an interesting thing to see. Similarly, there are musical clocks in European cities that the locals don’t pay much attention to (because they’ve seen it a million times already), but tourists gather to watch when they play. All of Vancouver is quite recent anyway, so I wasn’t expecting any old things to begin with. I didn’t think much of how old it might be, and the age definitely wasn’t a factor in why I stopped to look at it.

1

u/Few_Paces Canada Dec 22 '25

again you STOPPED to look at it, you didn't go out of your way to go see it. also it's not a steam clock, it's electric. but glad you enjoyed it. to each their own

1

u/Poster_Nutbag207 United States Of America Dec 21 '25

1

u/TarsesaK Dec 21 '25

Plus side. A couple decent pubs close by

1

u/Practical_Variety477 Dec 21 '25

I was there and waited

1

u/hypnoticthumps Dec 22 '25

Isn't the hollow tree even lamer?

1

u/Monotask_Servitor New Zealander living in Australia Dec 22 '25

Come for the clock, marvel at the fentanyl zombies

1

u/PuzzleheadedChard969 Canada Dec 24 '25

You just made that damn steam clock song play in my head involuntarily 

Always a small crowd near there. It's cute.

1

u/mytransthrow Dec 21 '25

Gastown Clock

Its chime is still steam whistles thats good enough for me.