The WH Travellers Meeting of 2019 was an odd one: we did not visit a WHS! Not even a TWHS. We gathered at the Scottish island of Skye for what would have been an epic trip to St. Kilda . Unfortunately the boat trip out there was cancelled for both the main and the spare day. More on what we learned about the logistics of getting to St. Kilda later in this post. What was left were 24 international travelers roaming about northern Scotland and its islands.

The 25th and 26th of July 2019 went into the weather record books of Northwest Europe as the hottest days ever. Even the island of Skye, from where we were supposed to sail to St. Kilda, was sunny and dry at 22 degrees Celsius. Our trip however was cancelled by the cruise company due to the wind being “in the worst possible direction”. It was bitter to know that the trips just the day before and after we were scheduled did go on.

In hindsight and after talking to the locals on Skye, a departure from the island of …

The Tokaji Wine Region represents a distinct wine-growing tradition that has existed for at least a thousand years and has been preserved intact to date. The region is known for the Tokaji Aszú, the world's oldest wine that uses a process of 'noble rot'. The volcanic subsoil and the microclimate of the area are ideal for this type of viticulture. I visited the region as the last WHS in a series of 3 during my recent short trip to Hungary.

From Hortobagy , it takes an hour and a half of driving to arrive in the heart of this wine region. I did not expect too much from it: the site is in the bottom 100 of our rankings & well, it’s about wine again and I don’t drink that. Daydreaming along the way in the car, I just hoped to be able to sit in the sunshine on a terrace in Tokaj with a cappuccino and preferably also a piece of cake. That may seem like a simple wish, but something like that is certainly not a given in eastern Hungary.

The town of Tokaj …

Hortobágy National Park - the Puszta is a steppe landscape where man has left only temporary structures. Shepherds graze their horses, cows and sheep (species adapted to local conditions) here on the barren land. Fishponds were built in the early 20th century to vary the land use more. The park is also known for its variety of bird species. I had planned to focus mainly on the park’s natural features (though it’s a cultural site on our List) and I even brought a travel guide book to make the most of it.

I had 1 full day here (stayed for 2 nights) and focused on Route 1 described in the guide book. This is an all-day circuit by car, with stops and short walks along the way. Officially you do need a permit to visit any site in the national park that lies off the main road, but since the Visitor Center wasn’t open yet at 8 am when I went out I decided to start without one (in the end I never encountered any controls).

The route first goes eastwards from the town of Hortobagy, on the busy road B33. There you’ll find …

Hollókő is a traditional agricultural settlement of the North Hungarian Palóc community. The village consists of whitewashed half-timbered houses, which originated in the 17th and 18th centuries. It was completely rebuilt after a fire in 1909. The town was the first stop on my long weekend to Eastern Hungary, where I aimed to tick off 3 suspiciously low-ranked WHS.

I had some difficulty getting there. It should only be an hour's drive from Budapest airport, but there were lots of impediments:

• my flight already arrived with a delay of 10 minutes,
• the rental car parking space had moved to a far away place beyond the Ibis hotel,
• I lost my ticket to exit the parking so I had to go back to the Hertz counter for a new one,
• there was no satnav in the rental car, so I had to use my phone…. for which I forgot to bring the charger!
• using GPS for navigation the phone battery doesn't last much longer than a few hours, so I was already thinking of buying an old-fashioned map at a gas station; luckily I passed a large shopping mall where …

The Azeri capital of Baku will happily host (and fund) everything at the moment, recent examples include the European Games and the final of the 2018-19 UEFA Europa League. So it was no surprise that it stepped forward as the location of the WHC Session of 2019. The session in general went in a more civilized atmosphere than in the years before: negative recommendations lead to withdrawals, deferrals were accepted. But still there appears to be a gap between the Advisory Bodies (ICOMOS mostly) and the WHC. Most excitement came from Hungary, which withdrew 1 location of its lot within the Danube Limes at the last minute - blocking the whole nomination which was headed for inscription.

29 new sites were selected, with a number of long-deserving ones. Find below some aspects that warrant a closer look.

1. Missing WHS

From the Missing List that we compiled in 2014, a further 5 sites have now been inscribed as a WHS: Bagan (our number 1!), the Plain of Jars , the Frank Lloyd Wright Buildings , Vatnajökull National Park and Babylon .

2. Threatened by termite nests

We …

The Krzemionki Prehistoric Striped Flint Mining Region has been nominated by Poland to be included in the List this year. ICOMOS in its evaluation has asked for a Referral, mostly because of the need for adequate protection of all its components and the implementation of the management plan. Outstanding Universal Value has been proven though, also compared to the already inscribed Flint Mines of Spiennes . So an inscription seems imminent, be it this year or the next. On my recent Pentecost trip to Eastern Poland I made a small detour between Warsaw and Zamosc to check out what Krzemionki is all about.

"Krzemionki" is the name of a former village, but not the name of the current location. The main site lies between the villages of Sudół en Magonie, 8km northeast of Ostrowiec Świętokrzyski. I drove there in 2.5 hours from Warsaw airport. Nowadays it is a wooded area, with some administration buildings and a grand parking. This Saturday afternoon though there were only a few cars. When I bought my entrance ticket (18 zloty / 4.20 EUR), an English-speaking colleague was quickly called for help by the cashier lady. He told me that a …

After so many unsatisfying visits described by previous reviewers, I tried a different approach at covering Bialowieza Forest . I pre-booked a private tour into the Strict Reserve on the Polish side, a part that can only be visited with a licensed guide. This is also the core area that was originally inscribed in 1979 (the WHS has been extended several times since). I went with Arek Szymura of Pygmy Owl Nature Tours ; I knew he was serious when he suggested to meet up at 4am! Just in time before sunrise, it was light already and a pleasant 15 degrees Celsius.

So at 5 minutes to 4 I stood waiting in front of Bialowieza’s orthodox church. This lies next to the Palace Park, which I had visited the day before. Our tour started with a quick crossing of that park (with a short stop for observing a tawny owl) and exiting it again at the north-western corner. Between the park and the strict reserve is a stretch of some 500m of meadows, they were very pretty in the early morning light with a bit of haze. We encountered a small group of people with spotting …

Zamość , located in the Far East of Poland near the border with Ukraine, was one of the two WHS goals of my recent Pentecost trip. This year especially I am trying very hard to cover isolated sites like these in my quest to visit all European WHS. In January 2017 I calculated that I had 98 to do - now, in June 2019, I have only 24 to go (after excluding Turkey, Russia and Israel which are a bit too far and complex for weekend trips). I might be confronted however with an additional 4 to 9 after the 2019 WHC meeting that takes place early July.

I arrived in Zamość on Saturday around dinner time after a long day of driving and had looked forward to eating a meal at the famous Rynek square. But, lo and behold, a full stage had been set up there and a classical concert was about to start. Everyone who had managed to secure a spot at one of the terraces obviously stayed put to listen in.

Some time ago in our Whatsapp group we discussed what spoils a WHS visit (or a photo thereof): a …

Victoria Falls is an easy add-on to a Botswana trip because of its proximity to Kasane, the starting-point or endpoint of most safari tours through the country. From Kasane I was swiftly delivered in about an hour to Victoria Falls town in Zimbabwe. I saw the smoke and heard the thunder already the day before I visited the Falls itself – at the Ilalla Lodge where I was staying there is a constant noise as if there was an airport nearby. But it is that huge waterfall making itself heard 24x7.

My 'official' visit to the Falls started on the Zimbabwean side. I walked there in less than 10 minutes, that is how close they are to the town of Victoria Falls. Here you walk down a path with 19 vantage points. You hike for a bit, then you make a small detour to a lookout point and then you continue on the original path. Due to the large amount of water falling down and the spray that creates, it was especially hard to see anything in the central part of the Falls. The best photos can be taken from the side, at viewpoint #2 …

The TWHS registered as Chobe Linyanti System comprises the Chobe National Park and adjacent private wildlife reserves such as Selinda and Linyanti. Chobe NP itself actually already consists of 4 different zones, of which I visited Savuti and Chobe Riverfront (aka Serondela). Both were on the itinerary of my 6 night mobile camping safari, so I stayed in private camp areas inside the parks.

Chobe NP ranked 13th in the latest poll of best African safari parks and destinations : before Kruger and Etosha, but behind Serengeti, Mana Pools and South Luangwa (and its Botswana neighbours Okavango and Moremi). It is characterized as “Boat and classic safari, Big 5 present (rhino very rare), abundant elephants”.

Our first 2 nights were spent in Savuti. Savuti is named after the Savuti Marsh, a large former inland lake whose water supply is fed erratically by the Savuti Channel. It last overflowed in 2012 and in one of the artificial waterholes around the park you can see a breathing reminder of that: one hippo could not get away in time before it all dried up again, and he now spends his time alone in a little pool. A sad …