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You may be thinking: "yet another cave?! Caves are boring!" Well, you are right! After visiting many caves for art, rock formations, it does become boring. However, this cave is famous for having a huge amount of troglobite (refereed to by the official document as "troglobionates" which I assume is incorrect), animals that live in the darkness. The caves feature prominently olms common in caves in this area of the world. These aquatic salamanders have adapted to live in the dark and feed on small crustaceans, insects and snails. You may now be thinking that you never see these when you visit and the water puddles at the front of the cave look so clean, that's because they only live well beyond what visitors get to access.

Vjetrenica cave is just wedged between the borders of Croatia and Srpska, with the latter only having a sign post that you enter the region. Looking at the map you might think a trip from Croatia is quick but I found out the hard way that the nearby border post is for local residents only (~2015) and the "road" leading south isn't for the faint of heart. 

I emailed ahead to arrange a visit and met my lovely guide (pictured above, that's obviously not me) who confirmed the time and was waiting at the nearby restaurant/bar only a stone-throw away. We then drove up the 200m to the entrance even though it's perfectly walkable. The cave is really well done, with …

This is a site that I have visited 3 times, and, for animal lovers, it does not disappoint. I'm based in Southern California, so it's a long but do-able drive down the west side of Baja. In 2017, we drove and enjoyed the incredible "super bloom" in the desert. In March 2020, we flew from Los Angeles to Loreto, and were in the area precisely as the Covid Lockdown was occurring. The lockdown altered the last few days of our trip only.   

Unfortunately, the Baja area can be challenging to find accommodations. There are no chain hotels in the central area, such as San Ignacio, which is the most centrally located for whale watching. There are some bigger places in Guerrero Negro that might be perfect for people driving down. We booked a small house through hotels.com in San Ignacio. Internet was very sketchy there and the accommodations are very basic. Also it can be difficult to plan the boating trips in advance. This can limit the pre-trip enthusiasm, because it's a long drive in from either the West or East Baja coast, and people prefer to know with certainty that they'll be getting on a boat once they get there. Somehow, it's always worked out for us.  

It's a fairly long (30-45 minutes) drive to the dock from San Igancio, and about the same if you're going to the Guerrero Negro sites. The roads are dirt. There's little or no traffic. It's marked but not often.  

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October 2020 - on our 3rd day in Lisbon we made a small trip by tram to see the other tentative sight of Aguas livres and walked all the way to the Gulbenkian Museum. The museum was already about to close, so we probably missed the most important part of the nomination. But we stepped into the headquarters for a moment. Nice modern architecture somewhere between Frank Lloyd Wright and Mies van der Rohe. The Garden has many nice elements and spots to relax. Lot of bamboo, ponds and old trees. All in all I believe though, that there are many more significant museums and especially gardens that would deserve Whs status. At least that way we got to see this.

Visited November 2020

Turkey has already the oldest proto-urban settlement (Neolithic Site of Çatalhöyük) and the oldest temple/sacred site (Göbekli Tepe) inscribed on World Heritage List, and probably soon the oldest palace or rather administrative and residential complex will find its place on the List – Archaeological Site of Arslantepe. By writing ‘oldest’ I mean the oldest and most remarkable found until now.

I’ve never heard about Arlsantepe before it was nominated for 2020; but reading the short description on Unesco site, I realized that this one is widely known as Melid, a late or neo-Hittite settlement located in Central Anatolia, far from any other Turkish heritage sites already inscribed. When you look at the map, it seems not so distant from Nemrut Dağı… But it only seems… And without a car, it takes hours and hours and multiple connections to get from one to the other. The closed place to visit for WH chasers is Harput, in Elaziğ, on TL from 2018.

So why do we have two different names for the same site? Melid or Malidiya in Hittite language was the name of the Neo-Hittite city established after the collapse of Hattuşa (13th/12th century B.C.). After the invasion of the Sea People, they (Hittites) moved south and south-east and occupied the territories already developed by previous inhabitants (Ishuwa for Hittites), like Carchemish, Zinchirli or today’s Malatya region. And this later place they called Malidiya. Let’s get back to 20th century: during the excavations works the …

Visiting the popular Tanzanian WHS has the disadvantage that it is difficult to organize it yourself - the best, and sometimes the only option, is to buy a safari. This is not my favorite sightseeing style, and when a travel agent offered me $ 500 for a 2-day trip to Kolo from Arusha, I had no hesitation in renting a car and driving there on my own. The rental itself is also not the cheapest - the standard rate for the smallest Toyota Rav 4 variant is $ 80 per day, but it gave me the freedom I wanted.

The road to Kolo is about 250 kilometers, which I covered in less than 4 hours. Even though the road is very nearly perfect, it is not worth going too fast, especially in residential areas - the Tanzanian police love to catch drivers in the least expected way. I paid fine twice - once caught by a policeman sitting in a truck, the second time when he took a picture of me perfectly on the line of the speed limit sign. "This is Tanzania, man," one of the drivers caught in the limitation told me. The fine is 30k TZS (approximately $ 12), regardless of the offense.

The Visitors Center is right on the Arusha-Dodoma road, it is impossible to miss it. There are supposedly a few guides waiting on site, so you don't have to book anything in advance - especially since, as I saw in the book …

October 2020 - our third and last WHS for that day. Unfortunately parts of it where under construction, so we could not e.g. marvel at the baroque facade. But inside there were many interesting elements again. Sacrophags of Portugals first kings and families. Beautiful fountains in the cloisters visited by numerous white doves. But the most unique part was the tiled kitchen. We originally thought it was something like a hamam for the monks, due to the „bathtubs“ and pool-like tiled construction under the giant chimney. All in all another wonderful monastery which certainly deserves WHS status.

Within the already incscribed Tabriz Bazaar complex also lies the ‘Blue Mosque’ (which also mysteriously still features on Iran’s Tentative List as Kaboud Mosque). Looking at the UNESCO map it seems indeed connected to the Grand Bazaar, but in practice it requires a taxi ride from the bazaar to get to this mosque. Its renovated brick backside faces the main street, but when you walk around it a monumental gate like that of the masterpieces in Uzbekistan appears.

This mosque was built in the style of the Mongolian Timurid dynasty in the second half of the 15th century. Tabriz was at that time the capital of East Persia. The mosque has suffered badly during the past - an earthquake in 1779 largely destroyed it. On 19th century sketches made by passing European travelers it is shown as virtually a ruin. Since then much brickwork has been added to make it whole again. But it is far from finished – according to our guide there is disagreement about how to proceed.

Both the exterior and interior tiling contains special calligraphic texts and geometric symbols that are not common for mosques. A series of swastikas from Zoroastrian Persia can be found for example.

The proposed Makgadikgadi Pans Landscape consist of three different locations the Makgadikgadi National Parks, Nxai Pan National Park and Nata Bird Sanctuary.

We managed to visit all three of them on our Namibia-Botswana roadtrip in April 2019.

From Kasane to Maun we did a stop-over close to Gweta. We stayed at Planet Baobab. As the name indicates, they had 17 great baobab trees on the hotel premises. The lodges were in traditional style, a great place to stay and convenient for a visit Makgadikgadi Pans Landscape. Enroute we made a visit to Nata Bird Sanctuary, truly a great place. It is one of the largest breeding sites of Lesser and Greater flamingo in the world and there were thousands of them on the shores of the pans along with other birds like pelicans, eagle, storks, and several different waders. We almost had the whole sanctuary to ourselves, really a beautiful place. A 4x4 car is recommended.

We arrived at the hotel early afternoon and decided to pay a visit to the eastern end of the Makgadikgadi National Park. A 4x4 is a must here. We spotted a great number of zebras along the way. The park is a feeding place to one of the most spectacular zebra-wildebeest migration on earth as they move from Boteti River to Chobe during dry season. Thinking back we recalled seeing none in Chobe. We were heading to the rim of the pans, but had to turn in order to exit the …

Norwegian landscape is represented on the world heritage list only by West Norwegian fjords. Two tentative sites will try to help this out, The Lofoten Islands and The Norwegian Lapponian Area – Tysfjord, the fjord of Hellemobotn and Rago.

The two parts Tysfjord and Rago are about 50-100 km apart, but both are connected to Padjelanta nation park, a part of the Swedish Lapponian area.

Tysfjord is a fairly large fjord, a wide one. It has a narrow inlet from Vestfjorden and then it widens and is a “palm with five fingers” – or five fjords. The southernmost one is the fjord of Hellemobotn. Here Norway is almost split in two, or you might see it differently – the place where Sweden is closest to the Atlantic (10 km on the ground or 6 km as the crow flies).The fjord is surrounded by high mountains on all sides, but some narrow strips along the fjord are the homestead of some of the Lule Sami people of Norway. At the end of the fjord is Hellemoboth and from there you can hike to some lookout points and further into Sweden.

A local tale says that when God created earth, on the sixth day (see picture – the 6 mark in the mountainside) he took his hand on to the ground from the ocean and all the way to Hellemobotn. He created the fjord and threw the rocks out to sea, thereby creating Lofoten. The people of Lofoten are …

October 2020 - this was our 2nd Whs visit that day. The giant and beautiful gothic monastery of Batalha. Before we entered we had a snack at the cafe just east of the monastery. The cathedral has some wonderful gothic elements but most stunning is the light. Due to the colorful windows there were green, red, yellow spots on the floors and spread a charming atmosphere. This followed us to the many separate parts of the cathedral. A curiosity of the buildings can be found in the unfinished chapel. Due to lack of money, the Kings rather wanted to finish Jeronimos Abbey in Lisbon and let it stand like this for another 500 years.

it is a gothic cathedral, so an overrepresented category on the List. But with the combiticket Tomar, Batalha, Alcobaca definitely worth the visit.

October 2020 - since all Portuguese mainland WHS sites are north and east of Lisbon, we decided not to travel along the Algarve and Southwestcoast. However, friends of us where in Portugal at the same time, so we visited them in Vila Nova de Milfontes. It is a cozy little surfer town. North of it you can find the Praia de Malhao with its beautiful cliffs, sand beach and coastal vegetation. I am positive that this must be one of the most beautiful spots of Portugal’s coast. We spent a whole day here with our friends and daughter, were swimming in the cold waves of the Atlantic, got sunburned and had good enough impressions that we could leave the coast the next day to continue to Evora and Elvas.

As part of our 2020 summer trip to the north of Norway, we did a short cut through northern Finland. We stayed overnight at the shore of Lake Inari.

In order to visit the Island of Ukonsaari, you will have to join a boat-trip. During summer there are daily tours leaving at 13:00 by Visit Inari. So what to do while waiting for the boat to leave? Two options: you can visit the Sami museum, Siida, or take a hike to Pielpajärvi Wilderness Church. The wooden church was built in 1760 after the Christianization of the local people on the site of an old Sami winter village. The easiest way to reach the church is to hike from Inari village, starting point of the trail is the Sarviniementie parking area. The hike is 5km one way through the woods.

We opted for the museum, figured we didn’t have enough time to do the hike. The museum includes an indoor exhibition and an open-air museum. We got a good introduction to the Sami people, the religion and their way of living. It was a nice and informative museum, and you can easily spend the morning there.

It was a nice sunny summer day north of the arctic circle and we really enjoyed the boat ride on the lake. Lake Inari is the third largest in Finland and there are about 3000 islands in the lake. The main goal was of course the holy island of Ukonsaari. Up until …

I'm shocked to see nobody has written something about the Three Gorges before now. After trying to read the official description I'm confused about what they deem special about the place - and that taking a cruise onboard the Changjiang (Long river) one would hardly be exposed to any of these. Anyhow, here is my travel report.

The cruise started from Chongqing and stops at the dam. From there you can take a plane out. Before the connections were very bad but I think it has been improved since then. The cruise takes 2 nights and 3 days. On the way you have optional excursions and one only pays for entrance tickets the temples etc, not for taking part in anything - of course each cruise is different but my point is that you get to see some cultural parts on the trip but apart from "beautiful scenery" there isn't much of animals or plants you can identify on the journey. My cruise ship also usually offers an extra boat trip to a smaller gorge but the weather conditions were not favorable enough. Sad. What I'm saying is that when you find a cruise operator you should check into side activities and see if they have something interesting.

The Three Gorges scenic spot is easily the best part of the trip. Even with the "controversial" damn having raised the water levels it still looks spectacular. The lookout point can get crowded. As you can see from my picture …

The German part of this tentative site was reduced from the original six locations to three in the final nomination. And rightly so in my opinion. The remaining ones are: Bad Kissingen, Baden Baden and Bad Ems. I agree with Els that Bad Ems is not really impressive. So my review will focus on the other two German sites.

As in most of the other spa towns, the hot springs in Baden Baden were already used by the Romans. The remains of the Roman baths can be visited below the market square. The boom in the 19th century is closely linked to the granting of the casino licence. In summer, the high society frequented Baden Baden: Europe’s nobility, but also artists, composers and writers. Especially the Russians. Dostoyevsky fell out with Turgenev here. And Nikolai Gogol wrote about Baden Baden: "I only wanted to stay three days, but for three weeks now I can't break away. No one here is seriously ill. Everyone comes here to amuse themselves."The most important spa buildings are the Kurhaus with the casino in the right wing and the Trinkhalle (pump room), both in neo-classical style with Corinthian columns. This is also where the Lichtentaler Allee begins, a two-kilometer-long footpath through an English garden along the river Oos. It is the usual promenade of the spa guests, you walk along typical examples of 19th century architecture: luxury hotels, museums and the theatre. A stroll through the villa district on the slopes above the park …

From the two inscribed locations, I only saw Kilwa Kisiwani. Kilwa Kisiwani is a vast ruin of the city which has been an important political and trade center from around the 8th century AD and since the 10th century the capital of the Sultanate of Kilwa. According to legend, the sultanate was founded by the rulers of Shiraz and, although historical sources do not currently confirm this thesis, it seems to be considered true among locals - the guide told me the same.

Regardless of the origin of the founders, the continuation of Kilwa Kisiwani's history is better documented. The Sultanate of Kilwa existed until the beginning of the 16th century. Its fall occurred with the arrival of the Portuguese, who, however, quickly gave way to the Omani.

All these rulers have left magnificent buildings in Kilwa Kisiwani. I started my trip from the Husuni Kubwa Palace, the spectacular ruins of the Sultan's Palace from the 14th century, i.e. from the times of the Kilwa Sultanate. The ruins are very well preserved and give a good idea of ​​how powerful this kingdom was - the palace is really spacious and equipped with many novelties, such as the first (at least according to the guide) swimming pool in Africa. From the 14th-century well dug by the slaves of the Sultan the inhabitants of the surrounding village still draw water - I saw it with my own eyes!

Husuni Kubwa Palace is about a kilometer to the remaining …

Kamakura is super popular no matter WHS or not. It doesn't really need the title to be a great visit. It was more or less rejected to be one anyway, but the Japanese state party decided to withdraw rather than get a rejection because they would otherwise be blocked from retrying. So instead Kamakura is now in limbo for many years, waiting to reshape it's niche as a world heritage site.

The main draw are Tsurugaoka Hachimangū and Kōtoku-in, with the The Great Buddha of Kamakura as depicted. I had already donated my front view to the website so I am using a close-up of it. One can even visit the inside as it is hollow. The temples along could easily be positioned as a world heritage site in today's criteria, with something like Quanzhou being in a similar position to have "influenced" or "be influenced by" something.

The main problem is that the political seat the samurai had in Kamakura is not possible to be seen anymore. It's a modern Japanese town, no skyscrapers, but many shops and retail avenues, roads everywhere. The title is actually misleading because the description talks about "cultural properties reminiscent of samurai culture" which doesn't fit in my opinion. Getting from temple to temple doesn't give you the feeling that the town belongs in-between them, at least not in the sense what the state party wishes you to believe. So I am agreeing with the soft rejection, or bad feedback, but believe …

I wasn't aware that these buildings were on the T-list when I first saw them. The area west of Chengdu features lots of these, but it could be that my bus tour didn't stop at one of the 15 that are planned to be inscribed - if anything, because I highly doubt the bad state of these towers and the massive reconstruction that has been needed to replace the fallen ones have any place on the world heritage list. I thus also didn't take any picture or not that I remember taking any, and am using this public domain one instead to give you an idea of what they look like. If you are thinking: San Gimignano meets Svanti - and you aren't far off because they were also used as high watchtowers and storage purposes. Oh, and Kaiping Dialou in Guangzhou are very different, I know it can be misleading with the name being similar.

So the main visit on my bus tour was, like you would know if you have ever partaken in a Chinese tour bus, shopping - in this case silver. The minorities have taken up the trade of flogging silverware to passing through clients from cutlery to ornaments and of course throwing all sorts of overpriced garbage like candy. I would not get out of my way to visit these towers so I suppose I'm happy to get it "ticked off" with any kind of passing by.

Though Selous has been visited by much fewer WHS enthusiasts than the other Tanzanian natural entries on the WH List, the park is by no means difficult to visit. Selous is located on a tourist trail, it is visited by many and there is no problem finding a safari there from Dar es Salaam or Zanzibar. Most of the visitors come there with small light aircraft from Zanzibar. You can get there from Dar by plane, but many tourists come also by land. The route takes about 5 hours and is terrible in places - I definitely do not recommend it without a decent 4x4. The accommodation base at the park itself is quite large, although due to the crisis caused by the pandemic, some places have been closed - temporarily or even permanently. I stayed at the African Safari Lodge, which I can recommend for its good cuisine.

At the beginning I would like to add that although the entry on the UNESCO list is still called Selous Game Reserve, the national park is not called that anymore. As part of the decolonization of names, at the request of president Magufuli, it was renamed into Nyerere National Park. This is how almost everything in Tanzania is named after the country's first president.

Selous is the largest national park in Tanzania, occupying 55 thousand square kilometers, which is about the same as the entire territory of Croatia. However, tourist traffic is concentrated mainly in its north-eastern part. …

This entry consists of several components, but beware - only some of them are available for visiting. Places such as Una Biological Reserve and CEPLAC Experimental Station are open only to scientists and cannot be visited by tourists. The most popular components are definitely open - Discovery National Park, Monte Pascoal National Park and Pau Brasil National Park. I and my family visited only the latter.

Be warned that Google Maps gives inaccurate coordinates for Pau Brasil NP. Actually the Visitors Center is located near Arraial d'Ajuda. To get there, follow the BA-001 road towards Trancoso and, a few kilometers after the junction with the BA-986 road, turn right following the signs.

We got to the Visitors Center at 1.15 pm and although the park was officially open, tourists were only allowed in until 1.00 pm. Fortunately, the ranger took pity and called a guide who arrived in half an hour and took us to the park. I paid 140 reais for admission tickets for the whole family, with a guide and an off-road car included in the price.

A guide in Pau Brasil is essential, as is a decent 4WD car (although you can also visit the park by bike, tours are organized from Arraial d'Ajuda). From the Visitors Center to the hiking paths it was necessary to drive a few kilometers in a very dense forest, on a terrible road. There are about 10 different routes available on site, but due to the late hour, …

In mid-March 2020, a few days before the world imploded, we spent two days in Nazca. This town was squeezed between Ica and Cusco (long night bus) in my Peruvian itinerary. We spent the first day shopping for airlines and then visited the Acueductos de Cantalloc (probably a T site). We finally chose to fly with Air Brag. Our research in the city led us to believe that all the companies offered pretty much the same circuit and service at the same price. All passengers now seem to enjoy a window (no more rows of three seats). Regulation also seemed to have been tightened in recent years and the horror stories that can be read online seem to be mostly a thing of the past. We had two pilots and the plane seemed to be in good condition.

The next day, early in the morning, we flew over all the famous figures near the city. We can think of the whale, the astronaut, the monkey, the dog, the hummingbird, the condor, the parrot, the spider, the heron, the lizard, the tree and the hands. The size and quality of the figures is remarkable. However, although these figures are the best known images of the lines, they are not the most spectacular aspect of them. The straight lines and geometric shapes, although much simpler, are much more stunning. These lines extend for kilometres, straight as if they had been drawn with a ruler. And they intersect by tens of them. …