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I have only visited one of the two components to this site, Tarquinia, and I picked it only because it was closer to a train station than Cerveteri. There was a train every two hours out from Rome to Tarquinia, on the line up to Pisa, and the railway gave a great view over the Mediterranean as it passed close to the shoreline. From Tarquinia, there was a little shuttle bus up the hill into the town or, if you have time, the walk was only about 3 km or so into the town centre although it was quite steep and the countryside was not that interesting to walk through. Tarquinia itself is a nice quiet little town although lacking in pedestrian infrastructure, but where in Italy isn’t? The necropolis lies a little out of town to the east and you pass beneath the grand medieval walls to get there with a view back down the hill to the Mediterranean.

Entry into the site is still cash only as of November 2022, costing 10€ for a combined ticket to the necropolis and the museum in town. I arrived just after opening at 9am and had the whole place to myself, which was a real treat. There are about 15 painted tombs here, each one accessed through a little hut with stairs leading down to a glass window where you press a button to turn on the light and view what’s inside. Going up and down into all of them …

** Important public transport info at the end of this review **

The Tarnowskie mines (Góry means mines) are labelled as ‘Lead-Silver-Zinc’ – but what they actually produced was Galena, a lead ore that is one of the earliest minerals used by humans (as it is very easy to smelt) and has been mined and processed since ancient times including in pre-Columbian North America. The Romans already used it for their indoor plumbing. Galena can contain tiny grains of silver (0.2 – 1.2% in the case of Tarnowskie) and sometimes is used for its silver as the silver is worth 300 times more than an equal weight of lead. This rarely was the case at Tarnowskie however – it mainly played a supporting role in delivering the lead that was needed for smelting and refining silver that was found elsewhere (Carpathians, Ore Mountains).

The focus of this WHS is on the underground mine and its hydraulic engineering, and you have to join a tour to see it. From waiting around before the tour was to start and 'studying' the information panels, I learned from an extended version of this timeline that Goethe visited the site as well (in 1790). He wouldn’t have any language issues then as the region was Prussian at the time. I had to take a tour in Polish. Make sure to learn the contents of the printouts in English they give you by heart, as it is too dark inside to read it …

In 2022 I visited 7 locations of this tWHS as well as other related sites which are not included among the 15 locations.

Being based in Grottaferrata and in Viterbo for a couple of days I first ticked off Villa Grazioli and Villa Muti in Grottaferrata proper and Palazzo Chigi in Ariccia. Grottaferrata itself is quite pleasant but the locations I chose to visit were either closed or not very promising both from outside as well as inside. Same applies to Ariccia. In Grottaferrata I particularly enjoyed visiting the "Greek Abbey" or the Exarchic Monastery of Saint Mary, which has nothing to do with this tWHS, and from there I picked up a couple of brochures on the rather nearby WHS beech forest locations of Monte Raschio and Monte Cimino. To make a long story short, I decided against visited the remaining 8 components in and around Frascati, in favour of covering the newly spotted 2 WHS locations, covering Cerveteri WHS and spending some time at Lago Albano and Castelgandolfo. Within the latter's boundaries lies the Apostolic Palace of Castel Gandolfo (strangely left out of this tWHS) which served as a summer residence and vacation retreat for the Pope and has extraterritorial status as one of the properties of the Holy See and parts of the palace are accessible as a museum.

Although I had skipped 8 locations around Frascati, I was sure I was going to make up for that with the remaining 4 locations near Bracciano …

I visited all four components of this WHS in March 2023. With an asterisk, more on which later.

The two freely-accessible parts, the Ring of Brodgar and the Stones of Stenness both sit fairly close to each other on the major road that runs towards the western coastline of the Mainland Orkney and are impossible to miss. Each of them can be explored relatively quickly (although the parking lot for the Ring is a few hundred yards down the road from it). For my money, the Stones are more picturesque, while the Ring feels more spiritually charged. If you have extra time, walking around the Stones towards the shore will bring you after a couple of hundred yards to a relatively recently (1980s) discovered Barnhouse Settlement - not part of the WHS as it is, but worth a look for some.

The Maeshowe chambered cairn is also close by, but this is the one component that requires advanced reservations and a bit of additional time investment: you need to show up at the visitor center - which is not by the cairn - a few minutes before the start of the tour, and board a shuttle to go there and back for the guided portion of the tour that will last an hour or so. The mound is picturesque enough when seen from the outside and impressively built, if somewhat barren, on the inside. And then the guide will highlight runes and writings on the walls – admittedly …

I visited the Iglesia Parroquia de Cristo Obrero y Nuestra Señora de Lourdes in Atlántida in March 2022. As described by previous reviewers, I took a bus from Montevideo going east and got off at the intersection for Atlántida. I then walked to the church. At first glance, from the outside, the church appears rather small and not necessarily impressive. Walking around it, one can see the brick exterior and the corrugated walls. The campanile is probably the most original structure visible from the outside, with its tiny steps winding up to the bells. When I arrived, the church was closed, and a couple of American tourists were also checking it out. They didn't know how to get in any more than I did.

This information is perhaps the most relevant in this review. The man running Kiosco 29 on the street corner east of the church, near the butcher shop, knew the lady with the church keys and was able to call her. So, after waiting a few minutes, a beautiful old lady arrived on her bicycle with her summer dress and the keys to the church. Another group of visitors had arrived in the meantime and were also enjoying the opening of the doors. The atmosphere in the church is really special. The curvature of the walls is still visible, but the curvature of the ceiling adds to the decor and creates an impressive effect. The average visitor will not be able to judge whether this construction …

I visited this tWHS in 2022. Most probably I had already passed by Porta San Sebastiano and the rather ugly and urban part of the Via Appia several times in the past, but I had no photos and no real idea what possible OUV this site has to offer. So this time round, I allowed a full day to hike as much as possible and check it out. Be advised that the way, although almost flat, can get muddy so sturdy hiking shoes will certainly help.

The Appian Way in Rome is an ancient road built in 312 b.C. by Appius Claudius Caecus. The city’s gateway to the East connected Rome with Capua. It stretched from the Roman Forum for 400 miles to Brindisi, where ships sailed to Egypt and Greece, and it served as a military and economic artery. The Appian Way was revolutionary for that period and was the first Roman road to feature lime cement. The natural starting point when staying in Rome proper is going to be Porta Latina or Porta San Sebastiano. The walls near the latter are far more stunning than the first part of the old Via Appia, so much so that there is an interesting Museo delle Mura inside. The constant traffic at the rather narrow two-way road, the lack of pavements sometimes, and the amount of bicycles and/or scooters might put you off at first as the only worthy monuments left to see are a replica of the Colonna del …

First I was super excited and looking forward to my flight from Santiago to Hanga Roa as it would mean that I will visit the best rated WHS of this community and one of the most popular travel dream destinations of my social environment that is not easily reachable from Europe. However everything changed on the day before the flight as our contact in the hostel of Hanga Roa explained to my girlfriend and me via chat that we can not visit almost any of the main archeological sites without a guide. We were the whole afternoon super angry of this new law starting from the post-pandemic re-opening of the island in August 2022 especially when we saw that prices for a personal guide could easily reach 100 USD per person for a day (so 200 USD for two. We also didn't really understand why it's a per person price for a guide). Being on a long backpackers trip and having booked my flights that I couldn't cancel anymore one day before I felt like I had trapped in a tourist trap. Angrily we decided to make the best of our stay on this special island however and spend 500 USD more rather than being there and not make the best of these 5 special days. We were really tired when we reached the island as we woke up at 5 a.m. Santiago time or 3 a.m. Hanga Roa time. By 2 p.m. we had reached the hostel and our …

Visited May 2022

As it has been a while since the last review of the one of the most important site of the long ‘gone and forgotten’ civilization of Indus valley, I’ve chosen this one to write a short review of it, one year after my visit Pakistan. Now when travelling around Pakistan is safe (and still very, very cheap) I wonder why so few decide to visit this amazing country and its amazing monuments and nature.

In my opinion for each traveller to Pakistan Mohenjo Daro should be destination NUMBER ONE. I’ve chosen it to be my UNESCO site 700th and a birthday gift for myself. I remember when I was at school and learning about ancient civilizations, Mohenjo Daro was the most mysterious place and ‘Harappan civilization’ sounded so different and exciting… At the university when I was studying linguistics and comparative grammar, the writing and symbols found in MD (together with those from Dholavira) were firing my imagination… (And now, after having visited MH and Harappa, Indus script remains something that I like to look at in the books and my photos, simply for the pleasure of looking and thinking about that past…)

For sure, Mohenjo Daro is the most difficult to reach UNESCO site in Pakistan because of its remote location. There’s an airport very close to the archaeological site and the museum but the commercial flights stopped couple of years ago and no airlines are interested of relaunching connections from/to here. And …

TLDR I really liked this bridge and Philip has already covered the relevant practical and historical details below. I was fortunate that he offered to be my guide over a weekend to eastern Switzerland (and bits of Germany and Liechtenstein too) and can say I am in full agreement with all his points. So the best I can offer is my own journey from finding this bridge ugly and boring to thinking it should be inscribed as a masterpiece of human creative genius.

What makes something beautiful?

After a couple of decades of thinking about it, I’m pretty comfortable knowing that there isn’t really such a thing as objective beauty, rather we regularly arrive at things we can agree on as being pleasing mostly based on habit and convention. 

This is something I have been thinking about a lot since my visit to the Salgina bridge. I remember as a 16 year old first seeing pictures in a library book of this bridge and others by Robert Maillart, and being somewhat aghast (in the way only a teenager could be) that something so boring was being treated as something beautiful. But it stuck with me, would I ever really be able to understand what was beautiful about it?

If you had caught me in my 20s I could’ve recited some sort of academic argument for this bridge being important or attractive, but I wouldn’t have believed it. I would merely just be repeating what I had …

I visited the al ain oasis on the 20th of january 2023. I took the bus from Abu Dhabi's central bus station to Al Ain where I arrived around 2 hours later. I just walked from the bus station to the al ain national museum which was -unfortunetely-closed due to renovation works. I then walked to the nearby entrance of the oasis where a group of argentine soccer fans from Puerto Rico asked me to take a picture of them. Truly a funny situation.There are hardly any tourists in Al Ain,and I met a bunch of argentine soccer fans. Since I speak spanish I joined them and we walked together through the oasis. I learnt a little bit about life in puerto rico and their beloved club racing buenos aires.Two days later I learnt that their team racing had won 2-1 vs Boca Juniours in al ain.

Together we walked through the entire oasis till we arrived at the exit/entrance where the restaurants are located. The argentines had to leave due to lack of time. I for my part rented a bike for an hour and raced through the oasis once again taking every turn and discovering every inch of the oasis,so to speak.

I even managed to ride to the al ain palace,convincing the soldiers there to leave my bike just in front of their guard house(forbidden,but hey I am a foreign visitor.....besides I didnt have a lock for my rented bike). I rushed through that palace …

Visited February 2023.

Well, well, well… I must admit that the presence of the temple Phra That Phanom in That Phanom town, very close to Mekong River and the border with Laos is one of the strangest proposal to word heritage list I’ve ever seen (I can compare it with Palau’s Tet El Bad). I spent two hours and a half (yes, two hours and a half! because of the bus timetable; I could make it in 30 minutes or even less) walking around it, looking into the spaces and shrines open to the public, approaching the stupa from different angles, talking with few pilgrims, trying to figure out what are the “historic buildings and associated landscape”, looking back at the new paintings and sculptures on the temple’s walls… And no – I was not able to find the very well hidden outstanding universal value or even local value. It all looked to me so artificial, so unauthentic… The wat is popular among local Thai and Lao people. But when I asked about it my Thai colleagues from Bangkok and Korat, they both said it was a temple with a piece of Buddha’s collarbone, just a local temple, they’ve never visited. Neither their parents who are religious people. And the temple looks new, because it is new: it was rebuilt after the storm in 1975; and it was rebuilt not exactly as it looks before these heavy rains… Some say it is the oldest stupa in South-East Asia; some …

I visited Fray Bentos in March 2022. It is a unique site among the world heritage properties. Indeed, it is a slaughterhouse and an industrial complex derived from the processing of beef. Previous reviewers have already explained well the importance of this complex and the immense influence it had on Uruguay and the rest of the world, mainly through the Oxo cubes consumed by both soldiers and great explorers. I was not familiar with this industry and its legacy before my visit, and I found it really fascinating.

I reached Fray Bentos from Argentina, from Gualeguaychu (a city I had reached from Posadas on an overnight bus). The bus connection between Gualeguaychu and Fray Bentos described by Nan was not back to normal in March 2022. So I took a cab from the Gualeguaychu bus station to the border. I then tried to hitch a ride to Fray Bentos, but finally got there on foot before anyone picked me up (it was only about 10 kilometers to my hotel and there were very few cars crossing the border at that early hour). I also walked to the Bario Ingles from the center of Fray Bentos.

Shandos describes the opening hours and the schedule of guided tours very well in her review (fortunately, because I forgot to note those details). However, it was very difficult to find this information up to date in March 2022. It should be noted that Argentina and Uruguay had only reopened their borders to …

We visited the Val d’Orcia region as part of our 40th wedding anniversary Italy heritage hunting adventure. I consider this a WHS within a WHS as we planned to hit Val d’Orcia together with Pienza. Started our visit at Montepulciano and after considering various transport options (including renting an electric bicycle to walking) decided to take a cab instead. The journey of about 10km took us through the Val d’Orcia region and I caught the signage that is a ‘must stop’ for us heritage hunters. Hope this is helpful as the Val d’Orcia region is huge and will take time to walk and get to feel of this beautiful part of Tuscany! This inscription signage is roughly halfway between Montepulciano and Pienza! Look out for it! For the rest of our 25 WHS ……here’s a compilation for viewing pleasure…..(see link)

Today I traveled by car to visit this site. Many others have described the fact that it's surrounded by structures that you actually don't see inscribed area from a distance. They also did an accurate evaluation of the site which I used to orient myself. I took the advice and put Plaza Mayor and then added parking in my GPS and found the parking lot Obispo Galarza ( 2 Euro for 3 hours). As you exit the garage, Head to the right. There is a walkway with an escalator on your left. Head down that way and bear right at the bottom. The will be a sign for Historic Center in Spanish taking you off to the left. At the end you are at Plaza Mayor. Across the Plaza looking to the left you will see the Tourist Center. They will give you a nice map and I told them I was here for the UNESCO sites and the lady gave me a brochure that is a publicity piece but has more of the history. Enjoy.

Visited February 2023.

Many things already said here about the site, so I am just sharing some practical info.

How to get there using public transportation? The best place to start is Udon Thani. Renting a car or a car with a driver is one of the solution, but if you do not want to spend a lot of money, go to Rangsina Market (there’s no transport to here from any of two bus stations in Ubon Thani!!!) in the morning, the first sorng-taa-ou (50 THB) leaves at 6:30, and the second at 8:30; it takes around one hour and a half to get to Ban Tew (depending of how many stops would be on the road). Show the driver the picture of the site or the name written in Thai and he’ll drop you in the village at the small junction (close to the small police station) where the road west leads to the Phu Phrabat Historical Park. It is still circa 5 km to the entrance to the park or 4 km to Buddhist Wat Phra Bua Bok, temple that was also mentioned in the nomination from 2016. You can walk, you can hitch-hike or you can ask at the small shop at the corner to take you there for a small money. I started walking to the park and after 3 minutes some man stopped and gave me a lift for free (he did not want any money).

At the site. There’s a small …

The Sungai Buloh Leprosarium has been added to Malaysia’s thin tentative list only in 2019, so they must have plans for it (although these are already being threatened by yet another highway). Sungai Buloh is a town in the state of Selangor. Its Leprosarium, built in 1930, was a self-contained living and working community within the town.

I got there by a combination of MRT and GrabTaxi from the center of Kuala Lumpur, which took 1.5 hours even though there is a MRT station called ‘Sungai Buloh’ on a direct line to KLCC. The ride was free as they only inaugurated this part of the line the day before (many locals on the train were taking pictures). In the Grab app, I did not find a logical destination to direct the taxi toward for the final 3km, so I just choose ‘Hee Garden’. This is one of the many plant nurseries that nowadays occupy the area.

I visited on a sunny Friday morning and found the area pleasant enough for a stroll. The nurseries directly surround the core area of the former Leprosarium. I expected some gloomy and run-down buildings, caused by the unflattering picture in Zoë’s review, but it all looks very peaceful. There is no formal entrance, you can walk around the streets freely. Only the buildings were closed, some protected by bored-looking security guards. The community hall had a sign stating that it only opens on Sundays from 9-15.

With no interpretation …

Visited March 2023.

I think this could be a nice and interesting addition to WH list where medical institutions are not represented yet.

When you think leprosarium (or leper colony), you imagine an isolated community of people suffering from leprosy (Hansen’s disease) (i.e. Spinalonga, Greece, nominated in 2020, but withdrawn by Greece as a result of a lack of ICOMOS recommendation) – and you can be quite surprised when visiting this site. Today it is in the middle of Sungai Buloh town (and it can be easily reached from Kuala Lumpur Sentral by train and/or mrt, and then bus), in its modern neighbourhood where hospitals, clinics, medical schools and medical institutions are situated – these relatively new buildings (from sixties, seventies and even from the beginning of 21st century) occupy part of the so called Valley of Hope – it is the name given to this leprosy (kusta in Malay language) colony where people suffering from leprosy were not discriminated and isolated – as it happened in other leprosarium, but they were given the opportunity to integrate into the society by work, administration, education and religion. It was the second biggest leper colony in the world (after Culion in the Philippines). That was a very human approach to the disease and to the town planning too – all necessary buildings to serve this community were build in a green, beautiful natural setting – ‘garden city’. Research, experiments and trials in the Valley of Hope made it one of …

I visited all six churches on the circuit in March 2023. It was not particularly hot, mostly it was clouded and it rained every afternoon, which made the afternoons often cooler than the mornings. I entered Bolivia from Brazil, crossing the border between Corumba and Porto Quijarro. The passenger trains between Santa Cruz and Porto Quijarro have not been running for two years but there are busses leaving around 11 am (and there are night busses too). I took one of the busses, it was rather comfortable, if not too clean, and the bus dropped me off around 17.30h in San Jose. It was a Sunday afternoon and seeing the church open, I entered the church with my lugguge. The sight of the church made my heart jump a little in surprise. All churches would have that effect on me, except the one in Concepcion, which made a more reconstructed impression.

The church in San Jose is a brick structure, unlike the other ones. The courryard has beautiful naive paintings. While I was admiring the interior, a procession entered the church and the priest started to speak. I left with my luggage and found a hotel a little off the square, which was not too expensive and still had all the comforts. After that I came back and was happy to find the church open and empty. The church exterior is very beautifully lit at night.

I took a quiet day of rest on Monday where I visited …

From what is written on what is available online regarding its nomination, South Africa did a good job with site selection and which crucial stages in the history of the movement should be included. The Nara Document on Authenticity plays a key role in developing the OUV, and it is this kind of nomination that we should see more moving forward: veering away from what can only be seen tangibly, but also focusing on what they represent and how people themselves and others can relate to it. 

Growing up in the 90s, the Apartheid was an issue that was hard to miss. But, I must admit I did not fully understand it until only recently, after three separate visits to South Africa. The sites are but representative sites, and having been able to go around the country during those cherished visits, they definitely are just "flag bearers" of a deeper, more sophisticated struggle and story of victory that is global in scope, effort, and effect. 

I visited (inside and outside) five sites on this recent trip namely, the Union Buildings, the Palace of Justice and the Rivonia Trial Site, the Freedom Park Memorial Site, the Constitution Hill and Truth & Reconciliation Commission, as well as Sophiatown forced removal site. In my first visit to SA in 2016, I also got to substantially explore District Six in Cape Town (my friend once owned a unit at the heart of Zonnenbloem), which is part of the nomination but is not …

We were 20 metres above ground as we crossed the border. The wide valley of the turbulent River Ceiriog below tried its best to demarcate where England ended and Wales began, but it was no match for man’s ingenuity. As we walked the towpath of the Chirk Aqueduct there was a steady flow of Welsh water down the canal to our left, helping narrowboats navigate their way south into England. And just beyond it, a train nosed north over the Chirk Railway Viaduct where its journey between the English cities of Shrewsbury and Chester took it through Wales.

This was my third visit to Pontcysyllte Aqueduct and Canal – the third different area of the site and the first deliberate one. The site is a linear 11-mile stretch of what is now known as the Llangollen Canal, but was previously a branch of the Ellesmere Canal. My first was July 2009 when, in our early days of dating, my then girlfriend, knowing of my mild mania for all things UNESCO, brought me out to the newly-inscribed Pontycysyllte Aqueduct for a walk and a picnic. Reader, I married her. My second was again with her, but also with our 20-month-old son, on a sunny Summer day trip to the pleasant and touristy town of Llangollen. Put off by the price of a ride on the heritage steam railway we instead booked a trip on a horse-drawn boat up and down the narrow cutting from Llangollen Wharf. It wasn’t until …