World Heritage Site

Last week I was in Northeast Italy, celebrating the 10th anniversary of our immersive Art History course in Florence with my study mates (it turned out to be ‘only’ 9 years ago we found out during the trip). We were roughly in the Veneto Hotspot, covering Verona, Padua, Mantua, and Vicenza. I also added two days on my own in Bologna. These were all revisits for me. It's a region that has been popular for its treasures of art for centuries, even the French troops took a lot home from here as seen in the new Napoleonic booty connection.

Below are my Top Tips for Travel to the Veneto Hotspot as a WH Traveller in 2024.

1. Choose your base wisely

We have Venice as the center of the Veneto Hotspot and while its international airport and two inner-city WHS make this a logical choice, I’d recommend choosing a different base. Venice is the most expensive and the most touristy city in this region. For lower costs of hotels and food in restaurants, consider Verona, Padua, or even Bologna. The latter’s university crowd guarantees cheap eateries and the city has excellent train connections with the rest of Italy and a busy airport. 

2. Allocate at least a day per city

During my first trip to this region in 2007, I made the mistake of combining visits to Vicenza and Padua in one day. They’re just 20 minutes apart by train! I ended up missing the interior of the Villa Rotonda (photo 1, made it this time) and my time slot for the Scrovegni Chapel. This time we just did one day, one city and we travelled there from one base (so we did not have to change hotels). There’s so much to see in all of these cities. Many of the WHS also are serial sites, so you’ll need to visit several places anyhow. You’ll easily walk 12-20 km a day within the town limits.

3. Even Italy gets digital

I fear for the future of the Italian tobacco shops! On this trip, I didn’t have to search for one as bus tickets now can be bought via an app or in some cities even by just tapping your credit card. The Trenitalia app also works well for train tickets – say goodbye to the ‘validation stamp’!

4. It’s all quite relaxed

While Venice is always crowded and summer visits to this region should be avoided all around, the smaller cities in this batch are very pleasant in Spring and Autumn. They’re all a bit touristy (Verona probably the most), but nowhere it was uncomfortably busy or too tacky. Also, in comparison to 5-10 years ago, visiting rules often have been relaxed. You can take pictures inside everywhere, even of the most precious frescoes and paintings. You can buy tickets on the spot (even for Scrovegni’s Chapel) and they will accept both cash and cards. There’s also surprisingly little security at the sights (no bag scans etc), albeit most entrances are ‘guarded’ by fierce Italian women who will scold you for any reason. 

5. Padua is the best recent WHS. Overall.

It is hardly imaginable that Padua’s frescoes only were inscribed in 2021, as #57 of Italy’s 60 WHS. It is rated #9 in Italy now and #1 overall of the sites inscribed globally over the past 5 years. These frescoes will appeal to anyone, you don’t need to be an art lover or a religious person. The presentation of the major components also is very good (the Baptistery (photo 2) almost trumps the Scrovegni Chapel). The town wears its WH status proudly with notable banners stating “Padova Meravigliosa! Siamo Patrimonio UNESCO” (Italian for “Wir sind Welterbe”), and also a good new(?) plaque at its second WHS, the Botanical Garden (photo 3).

What’s your take on this region?

Wojciech’s recent review of the Minaret of Jam (“The road from Herat takes 13 hours…”) sparked a debate about whether this Afghan icon is The Most Remote Cultural WHS. A quick look at our “Takes more than 5 days”-connection brings up Bikini Atoll, but all other remote ones listed there are natural or mixed. In a quest to find more Remote Cultural WHS, I took a systematic approach.

The Approach

I started with a subset of sites that are rarely visited: a combination of the ‘least visited WHS’ (cutting it to 10 members or fewer that have visited) and the ones in the '1,000 visitors or fewer' connection. This resulted in a list of 46 different Cultural WHS.

Then I tried to measure the time it takes from a hub city to get to the WHS. With a hub city I mean a place with decent hotels and frequent onward connections to the rest of the country, including an international airport. I used what is mentioned in the reviews and also Google Maps. Timings are calculated under ‘normal’ conditions (no active war, no weather disruptions, not out-of-season).

I also added the time necessary to get from the hub to the international airport, as some hubs are already pretty remote. If that transfer takes 5h or more, I added a * to the site.

Finally, I divided them into 4 groups with increasing grades of remoteness.

The Results

Not too difficult

Even the 46 that are not often visited contain 34 sites that are actually not remote. They are either recent additions to the list so many people haven’t made the detour yet, or places that are quite hard to access for other reasons such as insecurity. 

Within 2 hours of a hub are: Ancient ferrous metallurgy sites (Ouagadougou), Ashur (Mosul), Bamiyan Valley (Bamyan), Deer Stone Monuments (Tsetserleg*), Gedeo Cultural landscape (Dila*), Hegmataneh (Hamedan or Kermanshah), Kazan Astronomical Observatories (Kazan), Kuk (Mount Hagen), Kujataa (Narsarsuaq), Melka Kunture and Balchit (Addis Abeba), Ruins of Loropéni (Gaoua*), Sado Island (Niigata). Tadrart Acacus (Ghat or Awaynat), Taputapuātea (Uturoa on Raiatea), Pleistocene Occupation Sites of South Africa (Sibudhu Cave: Durban). The place named within brackets after each WHS is the proposed hub.

With a bit more effort, but still less than 4 hours one way, the following can be reached: Ancient Kingdom of Saba (Sana’a), Hawraman/Uramanat  (Sanandaj), Lower Valley of the Awash (Semera), Moidams (Jorhat), Sudanese style mosques (Korhogo), Thimlich Ohinga (Kisumu), Tomb of Askia (Gao, pictured below, (c)Roman Bruehwiler).

Long day trip

It gets really serious with the following ones, which take 4 hours or more to reach from the hub, but are still feasible for a loooong day trip because you desperately want that ‘tick’:

1. Al-Faw – hub Abha 5.5h drive 
2. Dholavira – hub Bhuj, about 4h by car
3. Petroglyphs of the Lake Onega and the White Sea – hub Petrozavodsk, “then 370 km by rented car via surprisingly good road to Belomorsk.” 
4. Rudreshwara (Ramappa) Temple – hub Hyderabad, 4h by car
5. The Royal Court of Tiébélé – hub Ouagadougou, full day trip (~4 hours each way)

Overnight needed

In this final group, the sites are so remote that an overnight stay is required away from the hub. That night is spent in temporary or basic accommodations:

1. Bikini Atoll – hub Majuro, 3 days sailing from there.
2. Great Burkhan Khaldun - hub Ulaan Bator, the only reports I can find tell about spending the night at a ger camp nearby
3. Kenozero Lake - hub Arkhangelsk and still a 470 km ride by rail/car.
4. Mbanza Kongo – 6 hours by car from Luanda, can’t see another hub closer and the site is still unreviewed.
5. Minaret of Jam – hub Herat or Bamyan, both taking some 13 hours to reach.
6. Petroglyphs of the Mongolian Altai – no reviews yet, but the hub seems to be Ölgi (with a domestic airport and 35,000 inhabitants). You’d have to stay overnight camping somewhere closer to the petroglyphs.
7. SGang Gwaay – hub Vancouver, requires a flight to Sandspit and at least taking part in a 2-day boat tour to get to the right island. 
8. Sukur - hasn’t been visited by anyone, so?? Abuja airport is 14 hours away, so definitely a * as well.

I would like to hear whether you have any “intelligence” on the sites in the two last groups and if they can be reached faster. And also when you know of any other cultural WHS that takes at least a long day trip (4 hours or more one way) from a hub.

Solivagant often sends me inspirational things on WH-related topics, but I don’t always have the time to do something with them. This also was the case with ‘The World’s Greatest Natural Areas’. At the 24-hour ferry back from Ogasawara, I finally found some focused hours to digest this article published in 1982 by the Commission on National Parks and Protected Areas (CNPPA) of IUCN. This was in the early years of the World Heritage Convention, and they decided to come up with an indicative inventory of natural sites with the potential to be listed. It’s interesting to see where we stand now, 42 years later. 

The Inventory

The CNPPA came up with 219 different sites in its concise and well-written article, spread across the biogeographic realms as follows:

1. Nearctic: 33
2. Palaearctic: 42
3. Afrotropical: 47
4. Indomalayan: 31
5. Oceanian: 14
6. Australian: 13
7. Antarctic: 6
8. Neotropical: 33

Their WH status now

Of the 219 proposals, 115 sites have since acquired WH status and 29 more are on the Tentative Lists. Some WHS are partial representations of the proposals in “The World’s Greatest Natural Areas” – a smaller version was proposed (Marine Lakes of Palau instead of the Rock Islands eg.), or a broader version (Rainforests of Southern Mindanao instead of only Mt. Hamiguitan). Furthermore, they also included sites we now know only as cultural WHS, such as Rapa Nui, Nan Madol, Angkor, Niah Caves, Nikko, Mont Saint-Michel and Mogao Caves (I have not added those to the totals).

Findings

• With 219 considered worthy, in 1982 they were already thinking in the high range of numbers we have today (231 natural WHS to date, plus 40 mixed WHS).
• There seems to have been a focus on established ‘safari parks’ (Kruger, Perinet, and other well-known parks in Kenya, Tanzania, and South Africa) and other clear-cut areas such as those managed by the US National Park Service.
• Countries like Canada and the USA are extensively covered, while others such as Brazil and Papua New Guinea have very poor coverage. And it may have seemed unfathomable in 1982 that Iran could have natural WHS too and that China has reached 19 so far.
• For Antarctica, being aware of its special status, they chose a surrogate in the Australian Antarctic Territory.
• As this was a scientific exercise and not a state-centered process as is the WHC, they proposed the sensible combinations of both Iguaz(c)us, both Sundarbans, and Manas on both sites of the border. On the other hand, Bialowieza was seen as Polish only.
• The inclusion of Zhoukoudian (Choukotien) and the Niah Caves indicates that they considered early hominid fossil sites as nature, while they are categorized as cultural nowadays.

Missing Sites and Sites Missing

The list of 219 also provides inspiration for sites that are Missing from the List, but could be worthy candidates. There are 73 sites proposed by the CNPPA that we haven’t encountered yet in the WH domain. Regarding Indonesia for example, they have selected Siberut Island (isolated evolution of plants and birds) and Kutai Game Reserve (for Bornean gibbons and orangutans). In Venezuela, they name Henry Pittier NP for its spring and autumn migrations of millions of birds and butterflies.

The other way around, there have been natural and mixed WHS inscribed since that don’t feature at all in this inventory. No less than 162 of them! The more recent, niche ones (Wadi al Hitan, Vallee de Mai, Los Alerces, etc.) are all missing, and obviously no one thought about the Flow Country yet. Clear oversights include the Cape Floral region, Socotra, the big Sahara sites, any of the Brazilian Atlantic Forests, the Wadden Sea, Socotra, and Ilulissat. Sites like the Norwegian Fjords and Ha Long Bay are also notably missing: the scientists weren’t focused so much on natural beauty. 

I’ve published the lists of Greatest Natural Areas still on the T List and Greatest Natural Areas with no follow-up at all at the Forum for future reference. Pictures in this post show the non-represented Greatest of Perinet (now called Analamazaotra, Madagascar), Torres del Paine (Chile) and Etosha (Namibia).

With a four-week trip to seven of the most recent or most remote Japanese WHS, I have ‘completed’ the country, the second person on this website to do so after Zoë. It was a wonderful trip, my fourth to Japan, and I am certainly not done with it—there are still more areas to explore. I would like to go to Shikoku Island or Hokkaido in the winter, for example.

Below are my Top Tips for Travel to Japan as a WH Traveller in 2024.

1.      Being in Japan is better than seeing all its WHS

Just being in Japan and taking part in its daily life trumped the quality of its sights on each of my four visits. Think of a world where people are raised to be considerate of each other. You can roam the streets of the big cities alone late at night, or leave your bag unattended when you pick up something from a counter or go to the toilet. One with the best public transport system in the world. And with an extremely rich food culture. It’s a "Land of Instructions" too, sometimes bordering on the silly (see top photo), but those make things easier when renting a car or visiting a restaurant where you are supposed to grill your own meal.

2.      It's not for people who get seasick easily

I counted, and no less than 9 of Japan’s 26 WHS partially or fully cover one or more islands, not being one of the four main islands (Hokkaido, Honshu, Shikoku, and Kyushu). They can all be easily reached using ferries or sometimes domestic flights, except for Okinoshima Island which is barred to visitors overall. Most voyages stay relatively close to the shore, so the level of 'turbulence' is generally low. Only the 24-hour ferry to Ogasawara crosses the open ocean for a long time.

3.      Trains aren’t always the best choice anymore

When I visited Japan for the first time in 2000, it was obvious that I should invest in a Japan Rail Pass. It was an easy and inexpensive way for foreigners to use most of Japan’s train network. However, the pass was hit by a 70% price increase last year. It may now only be useful to a first-time traveller to the country who wants to move around a lot on the main islands in a short time. Single train tickets are also expensive, Osaka to Hakata (2.5 hours/600km) will cost over 100 EUR. The train experience overall feels a bit dated (Japan isn’t great at digitizing its services in general), although the trains fortunately still run like clockwork! See also this Forum topic about which WHS are best accessible by train. Taking a domestic flight or renting a car are valuable alternatives nowadays. Japan has low-cost flyers as well which often are cheaper than long-distance trains. You need to bring a special International Drivers Licence (model 1949) to rent a car, but driving is easy. 

4.     You'll get a fair representation of the country

The WHS are nicely spread around the country and its outlying islands, and divided between cities and rural areas. From the main islands, only Shikoku is missing. Thematically, there could be room for modern Japanese architecture (I find the Corbusier site in Tokyo a joke). Like most countries, Japan overdoes it a bit on the subjects it values the most (industrialization in the broader sense) and its mines and industrial sites don’t do so well in our community ratings. The next ones in the nomination pipeline, Asuka-Fujiwara and Hikone-jo, are more classical Japanese sights.

5.      They don’t do well on the plaques

World Heritage Sites certainly are a ‘thing’ in Japan, but especially this time I noticed that the UNESCO WH logo rarely is displayed at its sites. The natural WHS are signposted as “World Natural Heritage Sites”, but rarely with a reference to UNESCO or to why they were inscribed. Sometimes they even have their own logos with the text ‘World Natural Heritage Site’ incorporated. This violates of course of our WHS Visitor Commandment #4: “You shall have a proper UNESCO plaque” (and it is a requirement in the guidelines from UNESCO too). What they do often have is a 'selfie-point' to immortalize you at the site, with a display of the site name (see photo 3, me at Shiretoko). At Tomioka Silk Mill, they even have one where you can have the exact date of your visit displayed.

It must be said though that Japan does very well on the other commandments, many sites are free to enter (and when they charge a small fee, you’ll get a proper ticket), they supply a lot of brochures including maps, there are official websites and the opening hours and other basics are rarely in doubt. Translations into English are often given, but usually, they are more limited than the Japanese texts. Sometimes they work with QR codes but these may not be operational.

Finally, I was thinking about the top 3 Japanese WHS and came up with the two best cultural sites (Nikko and Kyoto) and the two best natural sites (Yakushima and Ogasawara). Non-WHS that I enjoyed across the four visits include Matsumoto Castle and the Kibi Plain. Which additional sites in Japan would you put forward?

My first one from the “Takes 5 days or more to visit”-list! The Ogasawara Islands are a Japanese archipelago in the Northern Pacific Ocean about 1,000km south of Tokyo and 1,800km north of Guam. They can only be visited by a weekly ferry which takes 24 hours to cover the distance. About 2,500 people inhabit its two main islands. Settlers arrived here in the 19th century, the islands were mostly uninhabited before. After having been taken by the US during the Second World War, the islands were returned to Japan in 1968.

Despite being a group of islands, the OUV is not marine but firmly focused on land (rapidly diversifying land snails! endemic plants!) – even UNESCO seems to have forgotten that as its Gallery only shows photos of sea creatures. About 80% of the core zones of the 5 components are land-based. On Chichi-jima, where I stayed for 3 nights, the core zone of the WHS covers about 65% of this island; the coastal villages and agricultural fields are excluded.

The protected area that lies closest to the main settlement of Omura is Miyanohama Beach. And that is where I headed on my first afternoon on the island. It’s only a 1.2km walk, but I learned quickly that the hills on the island are very steep. The bay has characteristic volcanic arches and outcrops, and inland I got my first good look at the endemic, fruit-bearing Pandanus trees.

In the evening I joined a Night Tour. My main goal was to see a Bonin Flying Fox, the only endemic mammal of Ogasawara and a nocturnal creature. We started the 2-hour tour at the harbour, where we stared at some eel-like fish. Then we drove to Miyanohama Beach again, where 5 minibusses from other tour companies had already gathered at the parking lot. A long story in Japanese and a lot of anticipation followed (especially by me as I didn’t understand a word), but it turned out that we were to release baby green turtles into the sea! Staff from the Ogasawara Marine Center had brought boxes full of them and gave a box each to the tour leaders. It did feel a bit ambivalent though as green turtle features prominently on the menus of Ogasawara’s restaurants as sushi or in a stew. A licensed fishery is allowed to traditionally capture a limited number of green turtles yearly.  

This all took quite a bit of time, so I hoped it wouldn’t hinder my chances of seeing a Flying Fox. We drove to the south of the island (it’s so small that this takes about 15 minutes), stopping at a dark road lined with a series of Pandanus trees. This was the perfect place to look for a Bonin Flying Fox, as the fruits of this tree are its favourites. You could already tell by the mess on the ground that one had been active. It took a bit of searching by the guide (only red lens torches are used), but there it was: hanging upside down, with piercing eyes, and a frizzy hairstyle. Mission completed for me, and a slight revenge for the elusive Shiretoko Brown Bear. We finished the tour with a look at tiny fungi that glow in the dark.

On day two I took the local bus to the last stop, the “southernmost bus stop of Tokyo” (the whole of Ogasawara is a subprefecture of Tokyo). This area called after Kominato Beach is probably the best part of the island to explore on your own. It has a lovely sandy beach surrounded by cliffs showing displays of pillow lava rock created by underwater eruptions (see photo 1), there’s a river walk along the Yatsusegawa which is good for birds and generally scenic. And it’s the starting point for more strenuous hikes. You can walk along the mountain ridges to remote beaches 2 hours away. I only went to Nakajima Pass (20 minutes uphill), which was fully worth it for its stunning coastal views (see main site photo).

Back in the main village of Omura, there is a Visitor Center and a World Heritage Center. Here you can get a better understanding of the unique evolutionary processes that occurred in Ogasawara due to its isolation. It originated from a volcanic eruption, and every species now on it came flying or floating in from different regions. The centers also are probably the only place where you can see snails: the Nomination File is full of them, but in reality, they live mostly on the uninhabited islands and come out only in the wet season. Especially the evolutionary course of the Mandarina land snail is fascinating.

The main part of the national park on Chichi-jima consists of forested mountains. There is a mountain road, but it cannot be accessed by bus and hiking or biking it seems a stretch. Furthermore, several parts of the forest need an official guide to enter. So I chose to do a Forest Hiking Tour with a company called TAKE Nature Academy. As a group of 7, we went to visit 6 different habitats across the island and did a short walk at each of them. We ended up exactly where I had hoped to go. Highlights included Iwayama and Higashidaira Sanctuary. To both specific biosecurity rules apply: there’s a platform at the start of the trail where you have to scrub your shoes to get rid of seeds and spray the soles. There’s also a creative visitor counting system by placing coral rocks into a tube (photo 3).

Iwayama lies in the easternmost part of the island, the volcanic rock is exposed here and there are splendid views along the coast again. The Higashidaira Sanctuary, to protect the endemic Red-headed Wood Pigeon, immediately intrigued me when I saw it on a map during my preparations. This is firmly closed to outsiders, it is even fully fenced – not against tourists but because of feral cats, which have become the biggest threat to native birds. When walking it is common to see traps to catch them as well. I must say that the nature trail here was a bit of a letdown, although we saw some ‘new’ plant species. No bird in sight though!

I loved my stay in Ogasawara and would have happily extended it to 5 days if it were logistically possible – I didn’t do any water-based activities as these aren’t my favourites overall, but you can go whale watching or visit the uninhabited island of Minamijima where they have fossilized snails. Ogasawara combines the good parts of several other island WHS, such as the small-community vibe of Easter Island (the Farewell Ceremony at the ferry’s departure is so moving), the sweeping beaches of Fernando do Noronha, the steep forested slopes of Madeira and the high levels of endemism in plants and animals of the Galapagos Islands. There are lots of practical details to share as well of course as information on Ogasawara in English is scarce – I’ve gathered them all in this Forum post.

One of the things I like most about visiting WHS is that it opens up lesser-known regions even when the WHS itself isn’t too great. This is certainly the case for Sado Island, a lovely example of a slowish, rural Japan. Sado's size is fairly large, it even is the second largest island (after Okinawa) outside of the four main islands of Japan. Its other major tourist attraction in addition to the WH-listed Gold Mines is the Toki (Crested Ibis), which has been reintroduced here after it had become extinct in Japan.

I started my visit at the two mines of Sado Kinzan: Sohdayu (400 years old) and Dohyu (100 years old). The combined entrance fee is 1500 yen (9 EUR). You’re not forced on a guided tour here as is so common at other WH mines, dragging yourself behind a guide elaborating in Polish or Spanish. You just walk through the tunnels and see the exhibits at your own pace. The information is displayed in both Japanese and English. The OUV of the Sado mines lies in its Edo-period way of mining, but – as with Rosia Montana which is recognized for its Roman way of mining -  it is hard to ‘unsee’ the alterations and additions later mining generations made at the same spot. I also did not notice anything particularly Japanese about the methods used, although, at the end of the tour of the Sohdayu mine, a display shows that Shinto rituals were performed to celebrate the discovery of a new vein or to pray for the ore to become softer.

The iconic image of the Sado mines shows the Dohyu mountain split almost in two halves (see main site photo). This 30m wide crack already started to appear during the Edo period when they started open-cast mining from the top and went in deeper and deeper. As part of the exterior visiting route of the Dohyu mine, you can walk up to where the crack is (see photo below).

As part of the inscription of the Sado Gold Mines, Japan agreed to acknowledge the fate of the Korean labourers who were sent to work here during the Second World War. I didn’t see any of this displayed at the two mines that I visited, but if it is there it would be more appropriate to the mines from the Meiji era (such as the Kitazawa Flotation Plant, which lies a bit further downhill). A separate section at the Aikawa History Museum was also promised. 

What is acknowledged in the presentation of the Edo-era mines is the fate of the “unregistered” or “homeless” people who were sent to work here from 1789 onward. These were Japanese men down on their luck that were rounded off the streets of big cities such as Edo, Osaka and Nagasaki to do hard labour as drainage workers for 10 years in the mines on Sado Island. There’s also a memorial shrine to them along the road just south of the main mines. 

From Sado Kinzan, I walked down for 30 minutes to the town of Aikawa. This is a pleasant hike, with views of the bits and pieces of mining history scattered in the surrounding landscape. A major stop is the Sado Bugyosho: a reconstruction of the former Magistrate's Office (photo 3). The importance of the Edo-period Sado mines is partly derived from the many administrative records that have survived about its production and management. The Office comprises a vast complex, surrounded by a moat as all the precious gold was kept inside. At the exhibition in the Sohdayu mine, you can see a model of how it worked at the time, with offices, a mint and a smelting plant. Exhibits at the main office building are very sparse at the moment, or so understated that you must be Japanese to understand them. There is a bare room for example with only a sign ‘Oshirasu’ – later when I googled it, I saw that it means “Court of Law during the Edo period, in which the parties sat on white sand“. The second building that is open to the public has exhibits on the smelting process that was executed here.

Getting there on public transport

Although it’s not far from Tokyo, it’s a costly detour. A single train journey on the shinkansen from Tokyo to Niigata (2h) costs 68 EUR and the return jetfoil ticket to Sado Island from Niigata (1h) is over 80 EUR. Practically, you'd need to stay at least one night in Niigata. From Ryotsu port on Sado, bus #1 leaves about once an hour for the town of Aikawa. The schedule (which may change monthly) and routes can be found here. Some of those buses, including the 9.15 one that corresponds with the arrival of the 7.55 jetfoil from Niigata, continue directly to the Sado Gold Mines. Tickets can be purchased on the bus, using the old-school Japanese system paying the fare corresponding to a display above the driver, or you can get a one-day pass (1500 yen/9 EUR) at the Tourist Information Center at Ryotsu port. Catching the first jetfoil out and the last one back plus the bus inland, you will have about 5 hours in and around Aikawa and the Gold Mines, which is more than enough. 

It has been a long, hot summer in Japan this year. It still affected Hokkaido’s Shiretoko NP when I visited in early September – with daily temperatures of about 26 degrees, it wasn’t what I had expected. No mist and clouds, and it looked more like Central Sweden during Midsummer than a place notorious for its seasonal sea ice. 

Before going, it is important to understand which of the ‘seasons’ you’re in: this strongly affects which activities you can do and what animals you might see. There’s the ‘Drift Ice Season’ (mid-January to early March), the ‘Bear Active Season’ (May-July) and the ‘Eco Preservation Awareness Season’ (August to mid-November). Outside these tourist months, everything will be closed and roads are impassable due to snow. I flew into Memanbetsu Airport and rented a car from there (it’s a 1.5h drive). You can also get around on public transport but there aren’t many buses a day.

In September, the main trail at the Shiretoko Five Lakes can be walked independently (in ‘Bear Active Season’ you may not). You do need to get a permit though at the Shiretoko Goko Field House (costing a nominal 250 yen) and they make you attend a 13-minute presentation about the do’s and don’ts in the forest, and especially how to behave around bears (Don’t run!). The 3km long hike mostly follows a trail through the forest, which occasionally opens up for each of the five lakes. Several of the Japanese hikers that set off at the same time as I wore bear bells, so that probably scared the bears away if there were any present at all. Bears had been seen about every other day in August and September along this trail. During my hike, I only saw deer twice. The trail ends at the exemplary elevated wooden boardwalk, which entails the shorter hike you can do here.

A few km southward, a short trail leads from the Nature Center (one of the many interpretation / visitor centers of the park) to Furepe Waterfall. This is a fine hike in a more open setting than the one at Five Lakes. It provides good views of the higher mountains inland. The waterfall itself may be disappointing at first, as it trickles out of a crack fed by underground water from snow and rain (resembling “flowing tears”). However, the cliff has a steep drop of 60m into the Sea of Okhotsk.

In the evening, from 7.30-9.30 pm, I joined a Wildlife Night Drive with a company called Picchio. In a minivan, kitted out with binoculars and spotlights, we slowly drove the roads around the Nature Center and the Five Lakes access searching for animals. We quickly did find a young deer (a ‘Bambi’ also in Japanese), and later on a fox. We went looking for bears near the river, where the guide said they start coming this time of the year to eat the salmon. But we didn’t find one, and neither could we spot an owl. 

The next morning I drove the Shiretoko Pass to the other, eastern side of the peninsula. But not before I had made a little detour to the road which according to last night’s guide is best for bears in this season; it’s the road signposted to the onsen, parallel to Iwaubetsu River. Unfortunately, I came up empty (again). Driving the Shiretoko Pass isn’t anything spectacular this time of the year (it’s closed because of heavy snow from November to March). From the parking lot at the top, there’s an impressive view of Mount Rausu and the islands ‘floating on the clouds’ in the distance. I drove to the town of Rausu and then north on the coastal road, but this area isn’t nearly as developed for tourism as the Utoro side of the park. There are mostly fishermen’s villages. 

My final act for Shiretoko was joining one of the boat tours along the coast from Utoro. The tours are conducted in the open waters of the Sea of Okhotsk, which are often rough, and the coastline is very rocky. Over 50% of the cruises were cancelled during my first 2 days. Since the disastrous boating accident in 2022, where 26 people died, the operators may even have become more careful before sailing out. I had booked a 2h15 long tour with Aurora to Rutsha Bay at 9.15 am on my last morning. Not just to see a bit of the coastline, but also for the last opportunity to spot a bear: they like to visit Rutsha Bay (the company advertises an 87% success rate of spotting one). Well - my fate was the same as that of Randi & Svein Elias a year earlier: the boat turned around well before it reached its final destination. In this case, after about 35 minutes. We still got to see the funny rocks and caves included in the regular short tour, but we were back at the port an hour early (and got a partial refund).

Overall, Shiretoko is a pleasant national park that doesn’t present its unique qualities easily. It has a fascinating ecosystem where sea ice, phytoplankton, krill, salmons and bears play their part, but it is hard to witness this in action.

I guess few people outside of the Koreas often think about the Korean War (1950-1953). Still, it was a very bloody struggle with 3 million casualties, it saw a confrontation between China and the USA during the Cold War and its repercussions (such as the continuation of the Kim dynasty in the DPRK) are felt until today. To refresh my knowledge, I listened to two recent episodes of the podcast ‘Empire’ during my flight to South Korea, which dealt with the Korean War and the period leading up to it. 

As only one of two cities in the South never captured by the communist insurgents, Busan was the de facto capital of South Korea during the war period. It also hosted 500,000 refugees from the rest of the country, more than its regular inhabitants. The TWHS ‘Sites of the Busan Wartime Capital’ aims to illustrate that particular period in the city’s history via 9 component sites. I visited 3 of those.

I started at the Busan Citizens Park, which was a horse race track during the Japanese occupation of Korea and later the US Army Camp Hialeah. It was used by the US Army until 2006, but the grounds have since been returned to the City of Busan which transformed it into a public park. I strolled around it in the early evening, accompanied by joggers and people walking their dogs. A few signs and odd constructions give away its former use. There are guardposts and various forms of housing, including the remarkable Quonset Huts (photo 1) – prefab huts that were quick to construct but more durable than tents in the Korean climate. 

Close to the Toseong metro station are two further components, which I visited the next day. The Temporary Presidential Residence (now also known as the Provisional Capital Memorial Hall) was the residence of Syngman Rhee, at the time the president of South Korea. It is an interesting building that mixes Western and Japanese elements. You can walk through its rooms freely, and they have 2 videos of 7 minutes each (also in English) on show which give more context to the situation in Busan during the Korean War. For me, it helped make the period come alive (as if the war itself wasn’t bad enough, the city also was hit by a terrible fire in 1953 which led to even more casualties and more homeless people).

Not too far away lies the Ami-dong Tombstone Village. It takes a steep uphill walk, if you’re not keen on that there are also local buses. Ami-dong is one of the areas where the war refugees flocked to when the refugee camps in town were full. During the Japanese occupation, the area held a hillside cemetery, but the refugees transformed it into housing. What you’ll encounter nowadays is like a ‘favela’, with narrow passageways, lots of stairs and colourful tiny houses (but much safer to walk around in than in its Brazilian counterparts). People still live there. There are some signposts to notable buildings, but it’s such a maze that I didn’t find them all. The reuse of tombstones as spolia isn’t very visible. 

Overall, the selection of components has a somewhat similar approach to that of the Nelson Mandela Legacy Sites – together the parts form a narrative about that period in history. However, the Busan Wartime Capital is not proposed as a Site of Memory (which would be criterion vi), but as a criterion iii site (‘testimony to a cultural tradition or to a civilization’ - like Ayutthaya, and also the Hidden Christian Sites in the Nagasaki Region). This is odd, certainly taking into account that one of the components is the UN Memorial Cemetery. It might be an effort to avert opposition by China, Russia and the DPRK against the inscription of a site connected to a recent conflict that they view differently from the South Koreans. So for most of the components, the focus lies on construction techniques and urban planning (pragmatic ways of quick construction). Inscription chances seem quite low to me, but still, these are important places in South Korea’s history and I found it worthwhile to learn about them.

After having already introduced pages showing community member statistics and those for each of the WHS sessions over the past months, I had similar ones for the countries left to do. Of course, countries can also be ranked on their 'performance'. Kyle (winterkjm) already shared a nice appetizer at the Forum this week, as he compared countries on 10 key data points. It is remarkable how similar South Korea and Portugal are in their patterns.

The country statistics are spread across 3 different pages, which can be accessed here. I will introduce each of them below.

Core data

The main overview page shows:

Size: the State Parties ranked by geographical size. I could have chosen population numbers or GDP as well, but (as did Kyle) I found ‘size’ the most interesting denominator. The largest countries with relatively few (<10) WHS are Kazakhstan, Algeria, DR of Congo and Saudi Arabia.

Country: a list of all ‘countries’ that have ratified the WH Convention. New is Nauru (see its pretty flag above), of which it was confirmed this week that they ratified last July. It became our 196th  “country”. The Cook Islands and Niue (both associated states with New Zealand) are the odd ones out, as they aren’t UN members (all others are either full or observer members). 5 out of the 196 are on all-zeros: no WHS, no TWHS, no other activity.

The numbers of WHS and TWHS per country.

The number of times the country has been a Member of the World Heritage Committee. Mexico and Egypt have the most occurrences; at 27, they have been present at the WHC for over 58% of its years. An outlier here is Lebanon, a country small in size, that nevertheless was a member at 22 sessions. Austria and Czechia are fairly large countries that never have participated.

The number of Community Members that have ‘completed’ visiting all WHS in the country. We have shown those already on individual pages, but this is the first full overview. 17 countries have been uncompleted so far, with Australia, UK and France suffering from remote islands syndrome and 5 countries where no one could even ‘tick’ their two WHS (Nigeria, Cameroon, Republic of Congo, Gabon and the C.A.R. (photo 2 shows my 1 out of 2 for this country)). No less than 1052 people completed all WHS at the Holy See!

The number of reviews: it does say something about the popularity of a country. Germany is the number one here, probably due to the easy access to its WHS and many community members living nearby.

The average rating of the WHS in the country, already publicized earlier. A new one is the average approval rating of its TWHS; the future potential of Denmark, Belgium, Hungary and The Netherlands (to just name a few) doesn't look good. 

Most per decade

I also added a page 'Performance by Decade' where you can see the countries that added the most new WHS per decade. The ‘winners’ are: 

• 1978-1987: USA & India (both 17)
• 1988-1997: Italy (21)
• 1998-2007: China & Italy (both 16)
• 2008-2017: China (17)
• 2018-now: Germany (11)

If we consider the maximum of 1 new inscribed site per annum as the optimum, we notice that 13 countries overperformed in one or more decades. France, Spain and China even did so across 3 decades, and Germany in 4!

Level of success

Another page shows the most successful (and unsuccessful) countries in the nomination game.

• Perfect inscriptions: the countries with the most WHS (China, Italy) also have the most ‘perfect’ inscriptions (so without any debate: a recommendation of inscription by the advisory body, then inscribed at the first attempt.). 
• Sites that are or have been In Danger: here we find mostly countries tainted by war. Tanzania stands out as it has struggled with Ngorongoro, Kilwa Kisiwani, and (still) Selous.
• AB overruled: the countries that had to fight the hardest to get their site inscribed. If you have followed the debates in recent years, it’s no wonder that Iran tops this list. Since the inscription process has been smoothened over the years, it may tell us that Iran isn't successful in the pre-meeting exchange of ideas with the Advisory Bodies. India, Russia and Türkiye don't do well in that respect either.
• Incomplete dossiers: some countries just keep on trying without much result. Pakistan and Uzbekistan must be mentioned here. On the other hand, as I concluded in an earlier blog post, sending in an Incomplete Dossier isn't the end of the world - countries like Russia and Portugal got their sites inscribed on a later date anyway.

Do you have suggestions for other country-related WHS data that we could keep track of?

Ten days or so ago we learned that Indonesia is preparing a serial (transnational?) proposal for a Spice Route WHS. They have been at it for years, similar news items can be traced back online to 2016, a major conference was held in 2022 and hopes are up for spice tourism in Aceh Province. It leads to the question of to what extent ‘Spice’ is represented already on the WH List.

Aspects to consider

Finding spice-related WHS, or creating a brand new one, isn’t so easy, as ‘Spice’ is a multi-interpretable subject:

Framing: In the world of UNESCO, the Spice Route is part of the Silk Roads programme and is loosely mentioned in the Silk Roads Thematic Study. Usually, the distinction between the two is made between land-based routes and maritime routes. The image above shows the Spice Routes in blue and the land-based Silk Roads in red.

Era: There are at least three stages in history where the international Spice trade was important: Antiquity, the Middle Ages, and the Age of Discovery. It seems logical to focus on one period to create a cohesive proposal.

Flavours: ‘Spice’ is just a general term that groups specific products like cinnamon, cardamom, ginger, pepper, nutmeg, star anise, clove, and turmeric. It also includes chili pepper and vanilla, which originated in the Americas.

Types of sites: Spice goes through different phases, from agricultural production to (sea) transport, ending up at consumer markets. So what will the proposal be? A 'cultural route'? A cultural landscape? 

Current WHS with Spice OUV

We do have an existing connection for ‘Spice Route’, It is one of our earlier ones and not very precise in its description or rationale of the connected sites. Having a second look at WHS where “spice” is mentioned in the OUV statement, we only find:

• Petra (“a major caravan centre for the incense of Arabia, the silks of China and the spices of India”)
• Qalhat (a market town for “its own produce, dates, Arabian horses as well as spices and pearls”)
• Jeddah (“The goods the pilgrimage brought with them from Asia and Africa and sold in the city, ..., the spices, the food, and the intangible heritage of the city were all related to the pilgrimage”)
• Shibam (“Located at an important caravan halt on the spice and incense route across the Southern Arabian plateau”)

Digging a little deeper, into the AB evaluations and nomination files, we encounter:

• Incense Route of the Negev (“reflect the prosperity of the Nabatean Spice trade over five hundred years from the third century BC”)
• Tabriz Bazaar - "Tabriz is the most famous trade city of Asia, because caravans bring all types of goods. They bring silk, diamond, pictured cotton, cinnamon and spices from Tatarstan, Uzbekistan, Tibet, China and eastern India." (Nomination file p. 261)

So we find only a few references and mostly superficial ones. The Nabatean Spice trade from Antiquity may even be better represented than the later global spice trade stages. Interesting is also the link with South America (clearly outside of any historical ‘route’), for Rio de Janeiro is mentioned: "an acclimatising garden, destined to introduce the culture of spices from the East Indies to Brazil in June 1808, was the starting point for the Royal Garden" (Nomination file p. 374) (thanks to Shwabb1 for finding this and other rare occurrences).

What is more remarkable though is the many WHS where “spice” isn’t mentioned at all, but where it played an important role. Anywhere in South (East) Asia with Portuguese or Dutch colonial remains is likely to have played a part in the Spice trade during the Age of Discovery, eg. Galle (no reference in AB ev, but Wiki has it as the main entrepot for cinnamon around 1400). Zanzibar was a major site for clove production and its Stone Town was an important market. Macao, Hoi An, and Melaka are considered "part of the spice trade route and settlements of Western Traders" (AB ev of Melaka only). 

Identifying possible future Spice WHS

The Tentative Lists include more sites where spices played a role. Turkish Niksar and Ukrainian Bilhorod (Akkerman) are related to the Black Sea route of Spice trade. Silhouette Island (Seychelles) was a crop producer, as was Zee Ain (Saudi Arabia). Khor Dubai had a similar market function as others already mentioned, as did Dhaka (a market for the turmeric trade). The Historic and Marine Landscape of the Banda Islands (Indonesia) is the clearest of them all: "the original and sole location of the production of the spices nutmeg and mace during the most prosperous years of Dutch, English and Portuguese colonization" (see photo 3, © Collectie Tropenmuseum).

But there are also sites much further away: San Juan de Ulua (Mexico) and Port Royal (Jamaica) show evidence that they were connected to the global spice trade already in the 17th century. And what to think of Mayo Chinchipe - Marañón archaeological landscape, the cocoa site in Ecuador and the Pre-Hispanic Hydraulic System of the San Jorge River (a medieval site in Colombia that produced peppers)?

What will Indonesia propose?

The official website shows a ‘trail’ and a map with over 20 locations on different islands: Atjeh, Sumatra, Java, Bali, Celebes, Moluccas, Banda, and even West Papua. Sites that stand out are the Trading port of Makassar, the Banda Islands, and the Maluku Islands such as Makian Island, the Biggest Clove Producer in the Spice Islands, and Ternate .

Even for a national site, it seems complex. Extending it into a transnational site requires choices (which period, which OUV and appropriate types of sites) and lots of international cooperation – of which I do not see a coordinated effort. The closest ties are with Qatar and Malaysia. 

The question for a nomination of any kind is whether there are enough tangible remains. I would like to see them stay away from the colonial forts and focus on the cultural landscapes of spice production.

Have you visited a spice-related site on your travels?