Tuesday, July 29, 2014

The 1000+ places to visit before you die list

1,000 Places to See Before You Die is a travel book by Patricia Schultz. The title appeals to all bucket-listers. Unfortunately, the book doesn't keep the title's promise.

I am not at all happy about this list.
USA, Canada, British Isles, Caribbean and Australia and New Zealand is a bit more than 2/5 of the list (39,5 %)
Europe is a little less than 1/3 of the list (29,5%)
Rest of the world; Asia, Middle East, Africa, Middle and South America, Oceania and Antarctic gets what's left (22,5%)

So, if you are a white Anglo-Saxon American, this list might be something for you.
If you are not... not so much.

There's also quite a lot of hotels on the list.

I find it hard to believe there's nothing much to see in Singapore, except "The Eastern and Oriental Express", "Singapore street food" and "Raffles hotel".
In my mind Bukit Timah nature reserve might be something better to see and experience. The botanical gardens. Zoological gardens with nocturnal animals nighttime tour... And Chinatown, Little India, Arab Street...

The American Club in Wisconsin is a hotel. "a luxury spa and resort" with nothing much to see or do except some golf courses. The facilities count such amazing features like bidet and ice machine.

"To include a hot dog stand in Chicago and then skip the ruins of Carthage in Tunisia spoils the credibility of this book."

"The title is a fascinating idea but it's a misnomer. It should have been " My Favorite Expensive Hotels." Schultz goes to the Pyramids and talks about the hotel. She goes to Yellowstone and talks about the hotel, and so on and so on."

"I am not a hotel collector. If you aren't either, skip this book."

"If someone needs a place to start for places to visit, one need look no further than the list of World Heritage Sites (numbering nearly a thousand). Oh, and a spa (no matter where it is) is not a place to see before you die."

"I expected some kind of personal list of interesting places around the world. What I got is a listing that any armchair traveler can put together reading other guides."

"During the rest of my life I would like to see some of the amazing, fantastic, unusual, beautiful, and awe-inspiring things and places that exist on this planet (they do exist!). So what does Ms. Schultz suggest as the most important places that I should see before I die? HOTELS!! Hotels????"

"Also no listings for anything in Korea, a country of amazing heritage, food and art and yet nothing!"

So, do NOT use this as a traveling bucket list, if you REALLY want to EXPERIENCE something worth it!

Here's some 300 man-made places on earth to visit and here's some 300 natural wonders

I had the list on this blog, but as I don't think the places she list ARE something to see before you die, I made my own list.

One thing before we start.

If you travel to some place, you become a tourist.
Tourism is  VERY wearing for the natural sights and monuments.
Just the fact that we walk on the ground and breathe, just the fact that we exist in that place, leaves a mark. (skin cells, hair, sweat... we carry pores in our clothes and hair. We can be carrying seeds and parasites without knowing it.)

DO YOUR BEST TO LEAVE 
AS SMALL A MARK AS YOU POSSIBLY CAN!

The LEAST you can do, is to pick up anything you can see that doesn't belong there, never mind if it was you or someone else who left it.

Don't pee in waters, springs, lakes and pools. Absolutely do not wash your dirty laundry or dishes in springs or pools. Take your laundry to your hotel or home, do the dishes by a piece of paper that you then put in a garbage bag that you carry with you to a garbage bin, away from the place.

Don't throw your food in the nature for the animals to clean up.

Take everything back with you that you brought there. (It is acceptable to leave a stone to certain places, but that's it.)

Do not carve your mark anywhere. Not on stones, not in trees, not on cliffs, not in monuments, buildings, statues... One would think that's something self-evident, but apparently it's not.

Take your camera with you and take a photo of yourself by something recognizable, so that you can say "I was there!".

The 1000+ places to visit before you die list, part I - Europe
The 1000+ places to visit before you die list, part II - Asia
The 1000+ places to visit before you die list, part III - Africa
The 1000+ places to visit before you die list, part IV - Americas
The 1000+ places to visit before you die list, part V - Oceania and Antarktis 

Some traveling ideas

Silk Road - There has been several trade routes called "Silk Road" that an itinerary must be created for each effort to "travel the Silk Road"

Around the world in 80 days - Phineas Fogg's itinerary 

Amber Road

Inca trail to Machu Picchu

The Whale trail

The King's Trail

Camino de Santiago

The Seven Wonders of the World

* Great Pyramid of Giza
* Hanging Gardens of Babylon
* Temple of Artemis at Ephesus
* Statue of Zeus at Olympia
* Mausoleum at Halicarnassus
* Colossus of Rhodes
* Lighthouse of Alexandria

Suggestions for the Eighth Wonder of the World
Natural places:
* Milford Sound in New Zealand; called so by Rudyard Kipling
* Natural Bridge in Virginia, so dubbed by William Jennings Bryan
* Giant's Causeway in Northern Ireland, United Kingdom
* Burney Falls in California; called so by Theodore Roosevelt
* Gros Morne National Park in Newfoundland, Canada
* Uluru in Australia.
* Pink and White Terraces in New Zealand, prior to their destruction in the 1886 eruption of Mount Tarawera.

Pre-1900 creations
* Sigiriya in Matale District, Sri Lanka.
* The Banaue Rice Terraces in Ifugao, Philippines.
* Angkor Wat in Angkor, Cambodia.
* The Citadelle Laferrière in Northern Haiti.
* Great Wall of China, China
* The Taj Mahal, India
* Stonehenge, United Kingdom
* Machu Picchu, Peru
* Banaue Rice Terraces, Philippines
* The Citadelle Laferrière, Haiti
* Amber Room in the Catherine Palace near Saint Petersburg, Russia
* The monastery of San Lorenzo del Escorial, Spain.
* Sigiriya, Sri Lanka
* Royal Palace in Amsterdam, Netherlands
* Statue of Liberty, New York Harbor, United States
* Angkor Wat, Cambodia
* The moai statues of Easter Island, Chile
* The Terracotta Army, China

Post-1900 creations
* Delta Works, the Dutch provinces of Zeeland and Zuid-Holland, the Netherlands.
* Sydney Opera House, Sydney, Australia.
* Houston Astrodome
* Empire State Building, New York City
* Palm Islands of Dubai
* Panama Canal
* Karakoram Highway in Pakistan and China
* Sydney Opera House in Sydney, Australia
* Thames Barrier, London, England
* Bahá'í terraces, on Mount Carmel, Haifa, Israel.
* Three Gorges Dam in Hubei, China
* West Baden Springs Hotel
* Pikeville Cut-Through in Pikeville, Kentucky
* International Space Station in Orbit around Earth

New 7 Wonders of the World

Taj Mahal, Agra, Uttar Pradesh, India
Giza Necropolis, Giza, Egypt
Petra, Ma'an Governorate, Jordan
Colosseum, Rome, Italy    
Chichen Itza, Yucatán, Mexico    
Machu Picchu, Cuzco, Peru
Great Wall of China, China
Christ the Redeemer, Rio de Janeiro, Brazil

Other finalists:

Acropolis of Athens, Athens, Greece
Alhambra, Granada, Spain
Angkor Wat, Angkor, Cambodia
Eiffel Tower, Paris, France
Hagia Sophia, İstanbul, Turkey
Kiyomizu-dera, Kyoto, Japan
Moai, Easter Island, Chile
Neuschwanstein, Füssen, Germany
Red Square, Moscow, Russia    
Statue of Liberty, New York, United States
Stonehenge, Amesbury, United Kingdom
Sydney Opera House, Sydney, Australia
Timbuktu , Timbuktu, Mali


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