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Visiting in October 2018, the Komodo National Park was somewhat disappointing. The landscape is barren and sandy. Especially in October (end of dry season), most trees shed their leaves thus giving the impression of a dead or at least dying place. Here, I would definitely recommend other national parks in southeast Asia.

The highlight of KNP is anyhow what you will find under water. For divers, Komodo offers a variety of amazing marine life, including manta rays, sharks, moray eels, and green turtles.

There are those near misses that go on to anger you for years. I had been to Hanoi years back and we did the usual tourist itinerary including a visit to Uncle Ho. But I could not recall having been to Thang Long,

Now I don't mind near misses as much when it's a great site or at least a good one. For instance, as a kid we went both to Cornwall and Devon. I am not sure if we visited any of the inscribed areas; I only recall the sunny beach and the nice waves. And frankly, I really look forward to travelling there a second time 30 years later.

It's an entirely different thing, if the site is mediocre at best. As other reviewers have pointed out this is a really "doubtful" inscription asking themselves "why this site has been added". To put it bluntly: The site isn't that old, original or oustanding. In Vietnam itself you have Hue which is a way better site from mostly the same period.

And even if you feel Thang Long warrants an inscription I would argue that the site was not ready when it was inscribed. To this day (8 years later) they are still carrying out basic preservation work while a big chunk of the site is off limits due to the Vietnamese military using the compound as base. The ongoing use obviously also impairs preservation efforts.

In any case, I used a 21 hour …

Beng Mealea is about 75km away from the main group of the Angkor temples, therefore it is quite isolated from the rest of the archaeological area. It’s mostly surrounded by thick forest and it’s mostly collapsed. What is really interesting about this temple is the mystery that surround it. It is known that it was built during the Angkor Wat period, because of the architectural style, but its history is unknown. And yet, it is one of the largest Khmer temples. Moreover, being so isolated, not that many visitors reach this temple and private transportation has to be arranged. In my opinion, the hassle and the higher cost to get to Beng Mealea was totally worth it. That day I really felt like those explorers who found this temple after it had been forgotten for centuries in the jungle.

We visited the Kondoa rock art site from Arusha with a rented car. The archaeological museum where guides to visit the site(s) can be found is actually in Kolo, a little village 25 kilometres on the main road before you reach Kondoa. The whole stretch Arusha – Kolo is in very good condition and took us about 3.5 hours.

As we were told that the Thawi sites have the most varied paintings, we opted for these sites (more specifically sites D4A, D4B, D14 and D15). The downside is that these are probably one of the most remote sites which can be visited and a 4x4 is required – no way the area can be reached with a standard car. Taking this into account, the 20 kilometre drive (one way) took about one hour. 

As mentioned above, you can first pick up a guide at the Kolo archaeological museum and he/she accompagnies you in your car to the sites. Not only is this useful for background information about the paintings, but also absolutely necessary to find the sites since the (Thawi) sites are not indicated in any way. Once arrived in the area, also a 15 minute downhill walk is required to reach the paintings. 

The drawings in red paint show mostly animals (giraffes, rhinos, a bird’s head, ...), but also human figures. The absolute highlight is a very detailed painting of a rhino which still is in amazing condition. Since these sites are so remote and located …

Reading reviews about this site, I was not enclined to spend too much time trying to get to tick it.

I am not a big fan of animals in captivity. As I had a rental car on the Belarus side, my objective was (as Soligvant mentionned) to enter the UNESCO inscribed area and « experience » the forest. I tried to research the best way to visit the forest while skipping the touristic village (called « Father Frost Village ») or being driven around in a tractor for a « photo-safari ».

Not much information is available on the internet, I just went with google map and try to find a route through the northern part of the inscribed area. It is 1 :30 hours south from the city of Hrodna

I first tried the north-south road parrallel to the Belarus-Polisg border, leaving from Nezbodichi village. Unfortenately, this road is closed by military police, being in a border area, and is checked. I was (very politely) turned down just after having passed a big roadsign welcoming me into the national park (but not in the inscribed area after the 2014 boudary modification).

Leaving the border area I took a road 3 km east, leaving from the village of Grinki. Bad luck again. The road is blocked by a wooden fence just at the national park (and inscibed area) limit (see picture). The key to gate’s padlock is hidden in one of the stakes. Just after having …

In October 2018, I made a day trip from Aswan to visit Abu Simbel, two massive rock temples in Nubia, near Egypt’s southern border with Sudan. The twin temples were carved out of the mountainside more than 3,000 years ago, but eventually became buried by Sahara desert sand and forgotten until 1813, when found by the same Swiss orientalist who discovered Petra just a year before. But it’s Abu Simbel’s recent history that’s mind boggling. In the 1960s, Egypt began constructing the Aswan High Dam to control Nile flooding, provide water for irrigation and generate hydroelectricity, but whose rising waters would submerge the temples. It was decided to relocate the temples to higher ground. So, between 1964 and 1968, the temples were cut into massive blocks, dismantled, lifted and reassembled in a new location 65 meters higher and 200 meters farther from the Nile onto a purpose-built hill. In gratitude, the Egyptian government gifted temples to the main countries that took part in the relocation, which is how the Temple of Dendur came to be on display in the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York.

Due to some short term change in plans I found myself with a week to spend for private travels. Seeing flight prices at very short notice were unreasonable and having some bonus miles to spend with Deutsche Bahn (German Rail) I settled on the Dolomites. I got myself a train ticket from Hamburg to Bozen (Bolzano) in Südtirol (South Tirol). And off I went.

The Dolomites had been on my to visit list for a while. I enjoy mountains and some hiking. And the images of Drei Zinnen (Tre Cine) are iconic. Last but not least, Südtirol is one of those standard German vacations. It's not on the level of Mallorca, but certainly on par with the Lago di Garda. And I wanted to know what the fuzz is about.

I spent two nights in the area and explored two parts of the inscribed site: Schlern-Rosengarten National Park and Drei Zinnen National Park. According two Hubert these are also the best two locations of the site. But me visiting precisely those two was more of a coincidence. To me Drei Zinnen is the more iconic site while Schlern-Rosengarten offers better hiking options and gives a better overview of the diverse landscape.

In Schlern Rosengarten I crossed the mountain range from Seis to Weißlahnbad. While not as excruciating as my adventure in the Sardonic Alps with Philipp, this was still a strenuous hike. Especially coming down to Weißlahnbad was quite a challenge.

Looking back it was …

In October 2018, I made a day trip from Amman to Jerash, one of the largest and most well preserved Roman ruins outside Rome, and the second most inexcusable omission by UNESCO from its list of World Heritage Sites (after the temples of Bagan).

I was a bit baffeled by this project : it sounds like a trans-national nomination, but is only mentionned on the Belarus TL, with only three compnonents. I visited two on them on my 5-day visa-free visit to Belarus. It was close to my itinerary in and out of Hrodna.

I had a rental car, which made it easy to reach. There are no signposts, but I had printed out google maps.

The church-fortress in Muravanka, is few km south of the main Minsk-Hrdona M6 highway in the middle of the village of the same name. It was constructed between 1516 and 1542. It is an orthodox church with Gothic and Romanesque architecture style. Since 1990, the Church is again an active place of worship. It was closed the day I visited, but could get a good view of its impressives exterior walls and towers.

The second church is the Synkavichy Church. It is situated a few km west of the town of Slonim. The church was made of brick in the middle of the 16th century with Gothic-style features. The church was probably constructed by local workmen who used simple, not very precise sizing tools for the lay-out. It switched several times between Catholic and Orthodox church. Today the church is an active orthodox place of worship.

The defensive nature of both churches is visible from far, with their four towers on each corners, arrowslits and murder-holes. They are impressive and massive, especially …

On my last day in China I did a morning tour of my host city: Guangzhou. I started in Shamian Island and then made my way to the city center where I followed the tourist trail to visit the sites of the Southern Yue State. I failed to find the watergate but visited the palace museum and the tomb.

OUV

I found the ruins of the palace and the tomb a bit underwhelming. I know they are 2000 years old, but so are Roman ruins and these tend to be more impressive. The tomb has few decoarations and is very small. Even Svesthari looks great in comparison, let alone a site like Aigai. The musuem in Aigai is also superior in its presentation of the tombs, how it combines the visit of the site with the treasures found and the mood it sets.

I do see, though, that it seems weird not to have a Southern Yue state site considering the size and history of the region. My recommendation to the Chinese would be to go the European way and create a serial nominations including more archeological sites to tell more of the Southern Yue's history.

Getting To

All components are within walking distance in the city center of Guangzhou. I couldn't see/find the watergate. At the noted location is a shopping center. My assumption is that the gate is inside the shopping center, but I couldn't check this out as the shopping center …

I made my second trip to Jordan in October 2018. From the middle of the seventh century until the middle of the eighth, the Umayyad dynasty built several desert castles in what is now northeastern Jordan, which represent some of the most impressive examples of early Islamic architecture. I visited Qasr Amra and Qasr Al-Kharanah, two of the best known desert castles — but inexplicably only the former has been inscribed on the list of World Heritage Sites. I also visited Umayyad Palace on the Citadel Hill of Amman, from where all of hazy Amman could be seen.

Simply amazing to see how long humans have beenbeen practicing art. The guided tours are blissful (if you speak french) and you instantly forget that you are in a replica, because everything is so fascinating. 

Pulling into Kaiping by bus from Guangzhou I saw my first Diaolou. What a weird mix of castle tower and appartment building with some Asian decorations added to the mix. You will find the whole landsccape around Kaiping dotted with these structures and plenty of photo opportunities. The site itself covers three representative examples of this architecture. 

I started my visit in Zili, probably the most touristy one of the three villages. The premises and facilities indicate that they are devised to handle way more people than the few that showed up end of October. Zili is nice to explore with some buildings open for visitors. From the inside these look rather mundane, but this is to be expected. Obviously, you want to climb one of the towers for the view and photo opportunity.

After Zili I went by shuttle to Majanglong. Majanglong is surprisingly large. In the end I needed to hurry to catch my shuttle bus. Majanglong feels more like a true village. It's also the less touristy one, so I really enjoyed my time there. The individual buildings, though, are more spectacular in Zili.

Looking at Els review from 2007, things have changed dramatically. The Chinese have put in place a serious tourist infrastructure with combined tickets, a shuttle service instead of rikschas and plenty of restrooms. In Majanglong it felt there were more restrooms than tourists that day. China is changing fast.

Last but not least a few words on the merits. …

I visited Iraqi Kurdistan in October 2018. The ancient Citadel of Erbil has possibly been occupied for 7,000 years, since the fifth millennium BCE, making Erbil one of the oldest continuously inhabited areas in the world, although that’s somewhat contrived. In 2007, all but one of the 840 families living on the citadel were evicted prior to the start of a restoration project — a single family has been allowed to remain to ensure that there would be no interruption in the seven millenniums of unbroken inhabitation of the mound.

For four to five days in August, every two years, the most scenic square in Brussels is adorned with a floral carpet. When I decided to visit World War I sites in Belgium this past summer, I opted to time my trip to coincide with this exhibit in the Grand Place of Brussels. This year, on the 20th anniversary of the Grand Place becoming a World Heritage Site, Brussels chose to display a carpet celebrating the culture of Guanajuato, Mexico (yet another World Heritage Site). On the Tuesday night prior to the display, the square had been blocked off, patterns had been traced out in the square, and some boxes of flowers were beginning to arrive. I was amazed at how quickly the carpet had been assembled when I walked by the square again on Wednesday morning. I met up with friends on Wednesday afternoon, and we purchased tickets to view the carpet from the second floor of the impressive Town Hall. From the balcony we had an awesome view of the floral display, as well as of the numerous guildhouses enclosing the square. The Mexican theme of the carpet continued at night, with a lively sound and light display celebrating Mexican culture. Although I was less impressed with the remainder of Brussels as a city, the Grand Place of Brussels was definitely worth the visit.

Logistics: The Grand Place of Brussels is within easy walking distance of the Brussels Centraal railway station.

Following my visit to Danxiashan I ventured to Guilin to see the famous Li river section of the South China Karst. Already in Guilin itself you see plenty of rocks rising up and driving to the embarkment of my cruise I noticed even more. The scenery is spectacular and well worth the visit.

On my way back to Guilin we also travelled along the mountains, but this time on the other side. And this is where the site's shortcomings become clear. This isn't a huge fenced off National Park, but a scenic stretch along the river. On the other side of the mountains you are back in civilization with cars, highways and plenty of concrete buildings.

Getting There

I visited the Li river (Li Jiang / 漓江) part of the site from Guilin by cruise. Guilin is a less than 3h trip from Guangzhou South. See my comments on the Guangzhou train station in the China Danxia post.

The Li river cruises leave only in the morning; there are no noon or afternoon cruises. Which is a pity as you won't get the sunrise or sunset shot of the scenery.

It's next to impossible to get to Guilin from Guangzhou in time for the pickup (before 8 a.m.). So I stayed overnight in Guilin with the added benefit that hotels are way cheaper in Guilin than in Guangzhou (140 CNY vs 340 CNY).

In Guilin the train station for nearly all bullet trains is …

Always trying to stay ahead of the curve, i.e. the upcoming German nominations, and using a Deutsche Bahn free travel reward earned by countless commutes to Berlin I stayed for a night in Augsburg. I had passed through Augsburg often before when traveling between Stuttgart and Munich, but never made the effort of visiting. So it came as a pleasant surprise to find a lovely Southern German city.

I did most of my site seeing in the morning walking first in the direction of the Lech river and visiting the locations there. And then I headed back into town. I can confirm there is plenty of canals and water management in the city, but I did not see an outstanding component worthwhile mentioning.

Augsburg overall, though, holds plenty of interesting churches and other buildings, many due to the patron of the town, Jakob Fugger. Once (15-/16-century) dubbed the richest man in the world, he ruled from Augsburg a banking and trading empire with some mining operations thrown into the mix for good measure. To this day, the Fugger Bank continues to operate a private bank in Augsburg. The most notable structure of Fugger is the Fuggerei, the first social housing complex that operates to this day. For 0.90 EURper year and daily prayers for the Fugger family, a Catholic in need can reside in the complex.

Unfortunately, Augsburg was heavily bombed in the Second World War as several German weapon factories were located in …

Roi Mata is undoubtedly the biggest chief in Vanuatu's history. The "domain" inscribed is a triangle including his old tribe village, his burial grounds, as well as the cave where he supposedly died. Before you take the tour, and a tour is required, you should head to Vanuatu's national museum to not only learn about the chief and the domain, still listed as "attempting to inscribe" in the panels, other Vanuatu history, but also about Vanuatu's intangible heritage of sand drawing (better to wait for a tour of this to start but I think they only do this if enough people or if you come with a tour guide).

I was leaving in the afternoon and the typhoon was coming in anyway so I asked the tourist information to book a shorter tour without the village lunch. I don't know what they show you around the village but from having to drive there to get on the small boat I don't think there is much to see and a lunch just for myself would have been overkill. In the end I think this was a great choice.

Taking off to the appropriately hat island, the guide will tell you about the history of the place. They maintain the burial grounds here although it is only a small square. Unfortunately there was still plenty of trash washed ashore. Next stop is the fels/feles/fele's cave on Lelepa Island. The entrance is rather interesting to see the eroded walls. Inside you …

Trying to cover the sites of the newly defined Guangzhou hotspot, I visited Danxiashan on my first full day in China. These red rocks dot the landscape to the North of Shaoguan. The site itself is quite popular with Chinese tourists. When it comes to foreigners this is a bit off the beaten path, but I ran into a group of exchange students.

Personally, I had expected more of a canyon or mountain range. But these are more individual rocks rising high above the river with interesting reddish shapes and forms. Chinese seem to take extra pleasure in interpreting these. Normally, I have a hard time seeing what is meant. For the most reknown rock formation (image) this wasn't hard at all.

Getting There

Similar to Frederik I went via bullet train from Guangzhou to Shaoguan. Following his instructions I also managed to catch the local bus to the bus terminal (2 RMB). At the bus terminal, though, my luck ran out as I did not manage to find the busses to Danxia.

Luckily several cab drivers recognized me as a tourist and figured there could only be one reason why I was in Shaoguan. There are shared cab services between Shaoguan and Danxiashan. In the end I settled for that option (100 RMB, 45min from bus terminal). I also used the shared cab to get back to Shaoguan as they were just lingering outside the main parking lot of Danxiashan and catching the proper …

I have visited the Giza Plateau a few times, most recently in October 2018. I entered the Giza Plateau just as it was opening and headed to the Great Sphinx, one of the world’s most ancient, largest and, with the body of a lion and head of a pharaoh, oddest monumental sculptures. After 4,500 years, the most popular view of the Sphinx has become that from Pizza Hut.