Azerbaijan isn’t exactly a tourist magnet, but it does try really hard to reach out to the world. In a few weeks time it will stage its first Formula One race (on a street circuit just like Monaco!), and it has been host to the European Games and Eurovision Song Contest in recent years. Its capital Baku houses half of the country’s inhabitants, and is a sight to behold. A relatively small part of it, the Walled City of Baku with the Shirvanshah's Palace and Maiden Tower , has been designated as a world heritage site.

The Maiden Tower

Despite the "Walled" epithet, the medieval city center isn’t fully enclosed anymore. Only the western and northern side still are fortified. In our timeline we put ‘12th century’ as the age of this WHS, derived from the construction date of the landmark Maiden Tower. This tower lies on the edge of the old town, at a stretch without a continuing wall. It has a peculiar cylindrical shape, with a rectangle brick structure attached for additional stability necessary in this earthquake-prone region. It is climbable via an inner staircase, you’ll see …

Although some 85% of the current Azerbaijani population is Shi’a Muslim, Zoroasterianism still plays an important part in the image the nation presents to the outside world. After Azerbaijan's independence from Soviet Union, the phrase “Land of Fire” was coined as the slogan to promote the country as a tourist destination. It reflects both the natural burning of surface oil deposits and the oil-fueled fires in Zoroastrian temples. So it’s no wonder that one of these temples is on the country’s Tentative List: the Ateshgah at Surakhani .

Interpretation of how it might have looked like in the old days

According to this informative website about Zoroastrian heritage , the tradition of ‘fire-houses’ started with the development of community fire houses that housed an ever burning flame. The flame was kept going by professional fire keepers. Members of the community would light their house fires from the central community fire. These fire-houses later evolved into temples, which also served as solar observatories in order to fix dates for festivals. The Ateshgah (“home of fire”) at Surakhani lies about half an hour outside of Baku. On the way out there …

During the past Easter Weekend I used Oporto as a base to visit the Santiago de Compostela and Côa Valley WHS. With the introduction of low-cost flights, aiming at secondary airports, Oporto suddenly has become a ‘hot’ destination for a weekend-trip. My Transavia flight from Amsterdam was fully booked. I had been to Oporto before in 1991, as part of a one-month long Interrail-trip across the Iberian peninsula. I enjoyed it at the time because of its unique, somewhat raw atmosphere.

Built on hills

Unfortunately this time around the weather forecast for the day was terrible. I was tempted to stay in my hotel room all day. But the check-out time at 11 a.m. was non-negotiable, so I returned my rental car to the airport, put my larger backpack in a locker and took the subway to the center of Oporto. I exited at a stop called ‘Bolhão’, and the first thing I saw above ground was this fantastic Santa Catarina church (see 2nd picture), totally covered with azulejos. I suddenly felt glad to be travelling and exploring again, despite the rain. I had chosen this metro stop because …

So here they are , the long awaited results of the 2016 Vote to determine which are the most valuable ones out of the 1031 inscribed WHS. In all 64 people voted, for a total of 946 different WHS. This turn-out is a bit lower than our last popular vote in 2014 for the Missing WHS which attracted exactly 100 voters. I guess the current excercise might have been a bit too labour intensive for some. 40 subscribers voted in both events.

Sharing the number 1 spot: Angkor

The highest ranked are all very well-known sites, that also have shown up in the final stages of competitions such as New 7 Wonders of the World : the Pyramids, Angkor, Machu Picchu. Only the strong position of Vatican City surprised me, higher even than Rome itself – it only gained momentum in the last week of the voting, maybe we had an unusually high number of Roman-Catholic voters in? In the earlier stages of the voting, Angkor and Pompei did really well.

How does this selection …

I almost failed twice in visiting the Coa Valley Rock Art WHS . In 2002 I was all set to go with a confirmed tour booking, the only way to get into the WHS core zone, when I received an e-mail a few days beforehand that the site had been flooded. All visits were cancelled. On my next try, in March 2016, I enquired about a tour a week before and was told that those on Saturday were fully booked! The PAVC gave me a list of private tour companies that also arrange visits (at considerable cost I am afraid). Fortunately I was able to change to Sunday, and they had spaces left for that day. Phew. I could not imagine having to travel to this corner of Portugal for a third time just to see one left-over WHS!

Rock formations at Penascosa

In hindsight this one day delay proved to be a blessing during the Easter weekend: Sunday was the only bright day between two days full of rain. So I drove happily for 2.5 hours to this far corner of Portugal, once again passing the Alto Douro …

This was my last WHS left ‘to do’ on mainland Spain: the Old Town of Santiago de Compostela . Hidden away in the far west of the country, it’s actually better accessible from Portugal than from the main Spanish airports. I visited the city on a day trip by rental car from Oporto, on Holy Saturday . (I actually wrote ‘Easter Saturday’ at first, but in the English language this seems to be reserved for the Saturday after Easter Sunday).

Façade of the Colegio de San Jerónimo

There’s an hour time difference between Portugal and Spain, so I did not arrive as early as I had wanted. Most of the religious monuments are only open short hours, with a long lunch break or even no afternoon openings at all. And to make things worse it was raining heavily. I hurried directly to the city’s landmark, the Cathedral. Unfortunately its main entrance, the Façade of the Obradoiro with the Pórtico da Gloria, is undergoing restoration at the moment. You now have to enter via a side entrance. The Cathedral is huge and there’s a lot to admire - especially if …

One of the recurring topics at our Forum is the question “When can I count a WHS as visited?”. See for example #1 , #2 and the nagging doubts in #3 . Some WH travellers are straight-forward about it: they consider a WHS as visited when they have seen at least one monument or protected feature in the site's core zone. Others see it more from an esoteric perspective, ticking it off when they 'feel' like having visited a site.

A clear clue that you have arrived is always welcome

I plan to visit the Coa Valley and Siega Verde WHS next week, and this is a good example of the difficulties in determining what constitutes a ‘visit’. First of all, it’s a transboundary WHS. So do I have to visit both the Spanish and Portuguese parts? Second, the WHS is made up of 17 different locations. Do I have to visit 1, >50% or all of these locations? And have I ‘visited’ the WHS when I have set foot in the inscribed area, learned about it nearby (for example in the Coa …

Palmanova features twice on Italy’s current Tentative List: on its own as Fortress Town of Palmanova , ánd as part of The Venetian Works of Defence . The latter is a transnational serial nomination of fortifications in Italy, Croatia and Montenegro, which is scheduled for WH listing in 2017. The bid strategy seems to be using the already inscribed Venice and Kotor as virtual 'bookends', to be able to pull along a string of minor sites between them such as Zadar and this small town of Palmanova.

One of the 9 points of the star-shaped fortress

The fortress town of Palmanova was built by the Venetian Republic in 1593, in the shape of a nine-pointed star. These kind of star fortifications were fashionable in the late fifteenth and early sixteenth centuries primarily in response to the French invasion of the Italian peninsula. The French army was equipped with a new, more powerful cannon that was easily able to destroy traditional fortifications built in the Middle Ages. Palmanova certainly isn’t the only surviving star fortification: we have an ample connection for them already on this website. It is one of …

The Longobards took over a town called Forum Iulii from the Byzantines in the year 568. They established their first ‘Italian’ capital here and named it ‘Civitas Austriae’ or ‘City of the East’ (later italianized into 'Cividale'). Like their Roman predecessors, they went on to erect prestigious religious and private buildings to assert their power. This early medieval city has ended up as one of the seven locations comprising the Longobards in Italy WHS. Four of the other inscribed locations I have visited in previous years: intriguing buildings that made me curious for probably the prime example among the Longobard WHS locations: Cividale dei Friuli.

Very fine stucco in Cividale's Tempietto Longobardo

Cividale lies in the far northeast of Italy, just south of the Alps. It seems somewhat hard to reach by public transport. But a private railway company called ‘Ferrovie Udine Cividale’ runs an hourly train between Udine and Cividale. Its schedule will not show up at the Trenitalia website & is missing too from the Google Maps directions. One of the first things that I noticed upon arrival was a road sign pointing …

My first visit to Venice took place in 1987: it was my first holiday abroad without my parents, and I had joined a youth group tour to Slovenia that included a sidetrip to Venice. I remember nothing about what we did that day, and only have a few holiday snaps left of a gondolier in front of some church. So there is reason enough for a return visit to one of the richest cities in Italy in terms of history and art. But again in 2016, I had only one day to spare for Venice. This time I arrived by train from Aquileia via Cervignano.

Sea approach to Piazza San Marco

So how much ground can one actually cover in one day? During the train ride I noted down a mix of sights and activities from the 2005 Michelin Green Guide Italy and some ideas copied down beforehand from the internet. This resulted in an all-day itinerary of eight things-to-do: vaporetto to Canal Grande, St. Mark’s Basilica, Palazzo Ducale, Sta. Maria della Salute church, Ca d’Oro, I Frari church, Rialto bridge and Scuola di San Rocco. Unmissable from any …