My husband and I just got back from a trip to the Florida Keys. We stayed in the lower keys but spent time in Key West. We were dismayed to see the "disneyfication" of Key West. The place in now filled with cruise ships white sneakers and toddlers. Where there used to be funky local artists and bars there are now jewelry shops and chain eateries (hard rock, etc). Don't get me wrong it still has some attraction but I miss interacting with the more traditional rebellious Key West crowd.

So after ranting, here is my question, where can you go that has not been Disneyfied?

nlou

Montana

New England.

The Oregon Coast - but steer clear of Lincoln City and Seaside.

cuba

According to

www.wilderness.net/nwps/default.cfm

there are 105,772,197 acres of designated wilderness in the U.S. By law, none of them have ANY artificial "improvements," so there definitely isn't anything Disney-like in them.

r, you obviously haven't been to Cuba. Since gathering the huge European tourist market, it has been touristed to death and is now one of the tackiest and most "disneyfied" places around. Of course there are some quaint (read that crumbling)places within the cities, and some remote beaches. But anyplace you can stay feels like Atlantic City.

and Paul is right. There are hundred of thousands of acres of beautiful remote countryside and beaches in the US. I don't understand why people go to a busy resort area and then complain because it's touristy. If you want remote and unspoiled then stay away from those places. Shouldn't be too hard to figure out.

Out of the way places in Europe. For me, even the "touristy" places are worth it because they are authenic parts of history--not "tinsel town" or "disneyfied" worlds. But the out-of the way places are really incredible.

"Beautiful remote countryside and beaches" can be great, but that doesn't fulfill Nlou's stated desire for "funky local artists and bars" and a "rebellious crowd", etc.

I'd try Long Beach, California. Coyoacan (Mexico City). The funkier parts of Quebec City, Montreal, Chicago, San Francisco, and New York. Anywhere in the Caribbean that tour ships don't go - Tortola used to be great, but may have changed recently. And central Europe.

Nlou, so glad you braved the usual knee jerk reactions to honest frankness about a destination. I was just wondering how wise I was to skip Key West recently. Instead I found a rustic side of Florida alive and well.

On the web you can find tons of rural bluegrass and folk festivals in FL, often in parks with canoeing, foodstands, etc. Not exactly a substitute for "funk" but very old timey (or even hippy in the "folk" case) and still convenient to modern FL attractions.

What about New Orleans? Seemed pretty far from Disney to me. Fun, spontaneous, slightly gritty.

Asheville, NC is surprisingly "un-Disneyfied" ...despite the fact that Walt Disney once worked in the property office here and some of his earlier drawings can be seen in the margins of old blueprints for some of our historic buildings.

Asheville is a city full of charm and character, with a definite gritty side. You can find all the chain stores and restaurants here, but local businesses are far more popular with the citizens. You can shop at JC Penney, Dillard's, or Belk, for example, or you can buy your clothing downtown at any of a dozen shops that sell clothing of all styles for all tastes. You can buy your chocolate at Godiva (at the Asheville Mall), or you can buy it at the Chocolate Fetish in the Haywood Park Hotel, which has the best chocolate truffles in America, according to the LA Times.

You can sip coffee at any of a hundred local coffeehouses, but not at a Starbucks, since we don't have one -- and likely won't. A coffeehouse chain bases in Wilmington is invading before Starbucks can get their foot in the door.

You can shop at two organic supermarkets, or a locally owned market downtown, or at any of the usual chain supermarkets.

And the most telling evidence of the un-Disneyfication of Asheville: citizens shot down one proposal for a Super Mal-Wart, and on the spot where it was planned an new urban village will rise. Citizens attempted to shoot down a second proposal for a Super Mal-Wart, to be built on the site of a derelict factory, but lost -- but not quite. Instead of a typically sprawling strip shopping center, the new Super Mal-Wart will be incorporated into another new urban village featuring apartments, a hotel and conference center, and lots of smaller shops centered around a fountain boulevard.

And another piece of telling evidence: a columnist in our local independent weekly wrote a feature this past summer complaining bitterly about the fact that art in Asheville doesn't offend nearly as many people as it used to. He fears we're becoming another "Cupcake City".

I think not.

Nlou, if you would stop going to such tourist traps, you could stay away from the disneyfication. Key West? It doesn't get any worse. You should have stayed in the upper Keys. Islamorada is a beautiful place. Get out, get off the cruise ships and go some place original.

Actually zzz, everyone on this board raves about Key West. Key West used to be a great place about 30 years ago before blatant commercialism and cruise ships started docking at Mallory Square. You can still see some of it's funkiness if you get off of Duval Street.

Jan, ya think? Key West was undiscovered 30 years ago? If the OP would stay out of tourist traps, she would avoid disneyfication.

The only people who hung out in Key West 30 years ago were drug smugglers, con artists, people hiding out and freaks. Somewhere along the line freaks etc. became trendy and Key West became yuppie haven.

So Jan, so what people on this board rant and rave about Key West. People on this board also love Disney. Your comments don't make sense.

So what does anything you discribed have to do with Disney??? There are chilren and chain restaurants Everywhere.

I think Nlou is looking for places with unique character. There are plenty. Just go to the travel section at a bookstore and start pulling guide books off the shelves for different parts of the country. You can make a wondeful trip of it to seaports and inland from one side of this beautiful country to the other. I open my eyes and I see the Olympic Mountains, white and majestic, looming over the City of Seattle. I don't have to go far to find interesting, unique and diverse communities right in my backyard. Plus scenic beauty beyond compare.