One of the things I like most about visiting WHS is that it opens up lesser-known regions even when the WHS itself isn’t too great. This is certainly the case for Sado Island, a lovely example of a slowish, rural Japan. Sado's size is fairly large, it even is the second largest island (after Okinawa) outside of the four main islands of Japan. Its other major tourist attraction in addition to the WH-listed Gold Mines is the Toki (Crested Ibis), which has been reintroduced here after it had become extinct in Japan.

I started my visit at the two mines of Sado Kinzan: Sohdayu (400 years old) and Dohyu (100 years old). The combined entrance fee is 1500 yen (9 EUR). You’re not forced on a guided tour here as is so common at other WH mines, dragging yourself behind a guide elaborating in Polish or Spanish. You just walk through the tunnels and see the exhibits at your own pace. The information is displayed in both Japanese and English. The OUV of the Sado mines lies in its Edo-period way of mining, but – as with Rosia Montana which is recognized for its Roman way …

It has been a long, hot summer in Japan this year. It still affected Hokkaido’s Shiretoko NP when I visited in early September – with daily temperatures of about 26 degrees, it wasn’t what I had expected. No mist and clouds, and it looked more like Central Sweden during Midsummer than a place notorious for its seasonal sea ice.

Before going, it is important to understand which of the ‘seasons’ you’re in: this strongly affects which activities you can do and what animals you might see. There’s the ‘Drift Ice Season’ (mid-January to early March), the ‘Bear Active Season’ (May-July) and the ‘Eco Preservation Awareness Season’ (August to mid-November). Outside these tourist months, everything will be closed and roads are impassable due to snow. I flew into Memanbetsu Airport and rented a car from there (it’s a 1.5h drive). You can also get around on public transport but there aren’t many buses a day.

In September, the main trail at the Shiretoko Five Lakes can be walked independently (in ‘Bear Active Season’ you may not). You do need to get a permit though at the Shiretoko Goko Field House (costing a nominal 250 yen) and …

I guess few people outside of the Koreas often think about the Korean War (1950-1953). Still, it was a very bloody struggle with 3 million casualties, it saw a confrontation between China and the USA during the Cold War and its repercussions (such as the continuation of the Kim dynasty in the DPRK) are felt until today. To refresh my knowledge, I listened to two recent episodes of the podcast ‘Empire’ during my flight to South Korea, which dealt with the Korean War and the period leading up to it.

As only one of two cities in the South never captured by the communist insurgents, Busan was the de facto capital of South Korea during the war period. It also hosted 500,000 refugees from the rest of the country, more than its regular inhabitants. The TWHS ‘ Sites of the Busan Wartime Capital ’ aims to illustrate that particular period in the city’s history via 9 component sites. I visited 3 of those.

I started at the Busan Citizens Park, which was a horse race track during the Japanese occupation of Korea and later the US Army Camp Hialeah . It was used by the …

After having already introduced pages showing community member statistics and those for each of the WHS sessions over the past months, I had similar ones for the countries left to do. Of course, countries can also be ranked on their 'performance'. Kyle (winterkjm) already shared a nice appetizer at the Forum this week, as he compared countries on 10 key data points. It is remarkable how similar South Korea and Portugal are in their patterns.

The country statistics are spread across 3 different pages, which can be accessed here . I will introduce each of them below.

Core data

The main overview page shows:

Size : the State Parties ranked by geographical size. I could have chosen population numbers or GDP as well, but (as did Kyle) I found ‘size’ the most interesting denominator. The largest countries with relatively few (<10) WHS are Kazakhstan, Algeria, DR of Congo and Saudi Arabia.

Country : a list of all ‘countries’ that have ratified the WH Convention. New is Nauru (see its pretty flag above), of which it was confirmed this week that they ratified last July. It became our 196th “country”. The …

Ten days or so ago we learned that Indonesia is preparing a serial (transnational?) proposal for a Spice Route WHS. They have been at it for years, similar news items can be traced back online to 2016, a major conference was held in 2022 and hopes are up for spice tourism in Aceh Province. It leads to the question of to what extent ‘Spice’ is represented already on the WH List.

Aspects to consider

Finding spice-related WHS, or creating a brand new one, isn’t so easy, as ‘Spice’ is a multi-interpretable subject:

Framing : In the world of UNESCO, the Spice Route is part of the Silk Roads programme and is loosely mentioned in the Silk Roads Thematic Study. Usually, the distinction between the two is made between land-based routes and maritime routes. The image above shows the Spice Routes in blue and the land-based Silk Roads in red.

Era : There are at least three stages in history where the international Spice trade was important: Antiquity, the Middle Ages, and the Age of Discovery. It seems logical to focus on one period to create a cohesive proposal.

Flavours …

At the wrap-ups of the past WHC meetings , I’ve tried to incorporate some trends regarding the WHC process. These were based on ad-hoc queries of elements that stood out, such as the number of sites with a name change or those inscribed only on 1 criterion. I’ve now turned these into a proper page, where you can compare these key data against all years a WHC session was held. The page - best viewed on a laptop-wide screen – can be found here . What trends can we derive from it?

Notable years

The year with the most inscriptions was 2000: 61. Imagine the number of ‘armchair ticks’ you could have had from that! A further 13 were not inscribed at that session, so 74 were discussed at the meeting overall. That must have been a long session, although we don’t have a record of that since the live streams started only in 2012. On the other hand, 1989 only had 7 sites inscribed.

This year (2024) was the smoothest in history, with only 4 sites from the initial batch not being inscribed (I am counting those withdrawn right before the session as …

Since by the year 2024 “everyone has been everywhere” and many have become serious about WH travel planning, it is hard to find a place and time for a WHS meet-up. The best chances are those special opportunities that unlock places where access isn’t common. This year we have Astraftis a.k.a. Stormur to thank for pointing out the opening up of Hôtel Tassel, one of the Major Town Houses of Victor Horta , on the 3rd of August.

It led to a meet-up of 8 WH travellers. Brussels is of course the hotspot among WHS hotspots, so community members residing in Belgium, Luxemburg, Germany, the Netherlands and the UK signed up. Hôtel Tassel is very little visited - 100 visitors a year were given when the WHS was inscribed in 2000: it is in private ownership and in daily use as an office. They usually open it once or twice a year via a guided tour. On the morning we visited, 5 groups, divided into French/Dutch/English language tours, were allowed in (20pax each).

Hôtel Tassel is the work with the most historic value among the 4 Horta Houses. ICOMOS started its review with the …

The 2024 WHC Session went along swiftly, thanks to the Indian chairperson and some further measures to prevent lengthy discussions. Having to submit written amendments a day before the discussion is a plus, but limiting third-state parties or NGO’s taking the stage is more questionable and I think the WHC should avoid becoming like a Communist Party Meeting from the 1970s. Successful pre-meeting diplomacy was continued from last year, in this case between Japan and the Republic of South Korea regarding the Sado mines .

24 new sites were selected (photo 1 shows one of them, Lençóis Maranhenses ). Find below some aspects that warrant a closer look.

1. Missing WHS

We did not see one removed from our Missing List , but with the inscription of the Marquesas Islands at least for a small part the Rainforests of Polynesia has been filled in.

2. Most and least connections

For the first time, we tried hard to find connections for the possible new WHS already beforehand. Thanks a lot to all who contributed – I’d gladly continue this next year. Despite all efforts, Vjetrenica Cave and The Flow Country stayed hard to connect – they seem very specialized WHS. Schwerin …

I recently have been reading ‘The Seven Wonders of the Ancient World’ by Bettany Hughes . It’s a very comprehensive account of the sites on this ancient Wonder-list and is based on up-to-date research. She sets out to discover "what the Seven Wonders meant to 'them' - to our relatives across time - and what they do and can mean to us" . The introduction chapter also details the ways of early ‘list-making’ – Hellenistic travellers were just as enthusiastic about groupings as we are today, frequently using lists of sevens (the most beautiful rivers, the highest mountains, etc.). An explanation she provides is that these groupings give cohesion to history.

The Wonders

I learned quite a bit from the book and also found further links to (T)WHS, so I could upgrade the existing connection . The Seven Wonders in chronological order, what’s left to see and their link to (T)WHS, were:

1. The Great Pyramid at Giza : the oldest Wonder but the only one still standing and the main component of a WHS. Only the Romans weren’t impressed!

The Wonder features prominently in the OUV statement for Memphis and its …

Since introducing the Connections feature, 1531 connections with 27,141 connected sites have been added to this website. I was inspired by Jurre , who has so diligently inventoried connections for Italian WHS recently at the Forum, to discover what the amount of connections tells us about a WHS. To support this research, I made a new Ranking page called Connected that shows the number of connections each WHS has.

Best connected

It comes as no surprise that the large city centers with a long history dominate the Top 10 of WHS with the most connections:

Ferrara may be the odd one out, but its high ranking can be explained by the inclusion of the Po Delta with the city center of Ferrara.

Fewest connections

When we look at the 120 WHS with less than 10 connections, the following categories stand out:

Recent WHS

No less than 26 WHS from 2023 haven’t reached the 10 connections yet. The Viking Age Ring Fortresses only has 2!

This may teach us that the number of connections for a site grows over time. Or we should try harder directly after …