Despite protestations that you're not interested in tacky, touristy experiences, sometimes the cheesy option is simply essential.
Whether it's a cheap laugh, a gloriously kitsch tour or a comedy photo opportunity, some of the world's greatest travel experiences are so good because they are intensely corny. Such as ...
Hollywood celebrity-homes tour
It's hard to get tackier than being driven round Hollywood and Beverly Hills in a bus trying to get a glimpse of Barbra Streisand's fence or Tom Cruise's front lawn. But it'd be sacrilegious to go to
Los Angeles and not buy in to the whole star worship thing and the
Starline tour of Hollywood is surprisingly good fun.
It works on a few levels. First, it's a chance to go sightseeing. Second, you get the opportunity to see how disgustingly lavish some of the celebrity pads are. And third, you get plenty of Hollywood trivia, for example, finding out which street was used in Nightmare On Elm Street.
But it's the shameless ogling opportunities that most go for. Will you see Charlize Theron out jogging? Sean Connery pulling into his garage? The possibilities are endless.
Ferry 'cross the Mersey
Despite being a thoroughly unremarkable ferry ride on a dark, murky river, getting the ferry across the Mersey is still one of the most popular things to do in Liverpool, England.
Spare a thought for the staff, though. They have to hear that song on every crossing, usually accompanied by tourists swaying and bellowing along.
The Leaning Tower of Pisa
There are many buildings in the world people visit purely to take a photograph — the Eiffel Tower and Taj Mahal spring immediately to mind — but the Leaning Tower of Pisa is on a whole different level.
For some reason, the moment people get to the great field where the tower stands, they are overcome by the urge to pose in ridiculous positions that seemingly show them to be holding up, or pushing over, the tower.
The strange thing is, the tower is somewhat overshadowed by the fabulous cathedral next to it, but try telling that to the people on the bollards, pretending to push it over, or those lying on the grass trying to hold it up with their feet.
In fact, so many people are at it that Pisa must be the only city in the world where that many travellers visit just to get a cheesy photo.
Any town with a novelty road sign
Of course, there are other towns worthy of a detour just for a comic pic. In Austria, there is a town called Fu... okay, let's just say it rhymes with Ducking, shall we? The poor local council is constantly forced to appeal to English-speaking tourists, discouraging them from stealing the road signs.
Then there's McCracken's Rest on New Zealand's South Island. The views are lovely and there's a great beach nearby. But do people visit because of this? No, it's the chance to bare hairy bottom cheeks for the camera on top of the sign. Cheesy, but strangely essential.
Philadelphia Museum of Art
There are some excellent works within this museum, but don't make the mistake of believing that those folks rushing to the entrance are particularly keen on seeing a Picasso or a Matisse.
Poor curators ... no matter what fabulous exhibitions they put on, most visitors will be more interested in running up and down the steps, humming 'Burning Heart' and pretending they're Sylvester Stallone.
The reason, of course, is that these were the famous steps Sly ran up while in training montage mode in the original Rocky film. And this makes it something of a pilgrimage site for overgrown boys.
The Sound of Music tour
Salzburg in Austria is well known as the home of beautiful music — it was Mozart's hometown, for heaven's sake. But many of the tourists heading there couldn't care less about concertos and symphonies — they want to stand in a garden singing 'Do Re Mi' or climb every mountain pretending to be Julie Andrews.
The Sound of Music was set in and around Salzburg and there are numerous tour companies willing to play on this. The buses can often be filled with fanatics bellowing 'Eidelweiss' and the whole experience is a thorough exercise in kitsch.
Still, if you're prepared to join the girls and goatherds and go with the flow, it's strangely alluring.
Tales of Robin Hood
Tales of Robin Hood in Nottingham, England, somehow manages to tick all the requisite boxes when it comes to a truly great/awful tourist attraction. It has lots of waxwork models of characters from the Robin Hood myth; those wooden cut-out things you can stick your head through for photos; random out-of-work actors dressed as Robin; and lavishly decorated 3D scenes that just manage to look cheap. Throw in fake deer and goats and it all adds up to a wonderfully hokey attraction.
And just in case it wasn't endearingly bad enough, there's also the chance to attend a medieval banquet in the evening, complete with stereotypical buxom wenches serving beer.
Australia's big things
Of course, no list of cheesy tourist attractions would be complete without Australia's brilliantly tacky "Big" things. Dotting roadsides in small towns across the country are utterly random fibreglass creations, designed as a cunning ruse to pull in tourists with cameras. The original was the Big Banana in Coffs Harbour. Since then, hundreds of imitators have sprung up.
They're of varying degrees of quality — the Big Potato in Robertson, NSW, is frankly rubbish. But when they're good, they're splendidly fabulous examples of touristic cheese. Check out the Big Prawn that sprawls over a roof in Ballina, northern NSW, for example. Or the stunning Big Pineapple in Nambour, Queensland.
Be sure to check out our photo gallery of the world's cheesiest travel experiences by clicking here: 
Have you lined up to take any of these cheesy holiday pics? What's so appealing about corny travel experiences? Share your thoughts with us:
