After we left it a bit late this year to decide when and where to meet, we thought it's best to fix a date early.
The next WH Travellers Meetup will be during the 2nd weekend of September 2018 (which means September 8/9).

Save the date!

Venue to be decided.

Noted!

Ideas that were floated on our meetup:

* Calgary
* Jerusalem and Palestine
* Nessebar and Eastern Bulgaria
* St Kilda + Edinburgh
* Thessaloniki: Athos, Philippi

I would vote for Jerusalem.

Known Downsides:
* Athos requires a reservation and is only accessible for males.
* Situation in Jerusalem / Palestine can become dangerous.
* St Kilda is far off and departure day may vary due to adverse weather conditions.

Nobody mentioned St. Kilda? We discussed it last year and many ranked it high.

From these ideas I'd vote for Bulgaria. Thessaloniki is nice, too, but Athos is worth staying at least one night, which obviously won't be possible for some members.

I'd vote for St Kilda or simply the Edinburgh hotspot including St Kilda - there's also Lake District relatively close by now.

I have to admit Calgary looks very appealing, not only because it is on my continent, but also because it fits into travel goals of mine. Plus, the Canadian Rockies remain my favorite World Heritage Site, and are a beautiful site to visit.

Just a sidenote for Athos, there are couple of limitations when it comes to group wanting to visit - apart from only males able to make it, the booking should be made very far in advance as there is a limited amount of visitors per day/night they let in and it's even more limited when you're not Orthodox Christian.

Martina_R

Three months did it for me. And this was around Easter ;)

There is also a cruise you can take around the peninsula that is open for all genders. It also has the added benefit of being able to see more monasteries.

Personally I would love to have the meeting in Calgary. I do however fear that if it's outside Europe the cost and time factor will prevent many from participating. My more realistic favorite is Nessebar. I suggest we keep selecting a few more options and start a doodle to see who would be willing to participate at which location. I can toss in following ideas:

*Tunis
*Mexico City
*Beirut

I would love to be part of meetup, for once - maybe next year. A couple of ideas from the north:
- Iceland (with a boat tour to the core zone of the nominated area of Surtsey)
- Solovetsky Islands
- Vegaøyan

The question is which one is more important: to be able to visit as many sites as possible in the same area or to visit some exclusive site that few of us have visited and that is challenging to visit.

Sjobe

Requirements used to be:
* Interesting (not visited) for most community members, specifically our host.
* Costs within range, preferably not Norway / Iceland
* Option to travel onwards
* Some special ingredient.

There are rumors that visiting Athos is not that difficult now, even for non-Orthodox. My permit was issued one month before visit, but I talked to people who were able to get this on the spot (non-Orthodox, but with prearranged accomodation).

My ideal meetup would be with exclusive site. Surtsey is also a good idea - in an era of low cost carriers Iceland is not that expensive, especially for a short visit.

Tunis and Beirut also look cool... but would it attract enough users?

Eastern Bulgaria has the biggest appeal to me. I highly doubt we would fit the specialist criteria, but would Thracian tomb of Kazanlak offer an opportunity for our special access idea?

Just to throw out additional ideas, Western Turkey? Easy access to airports and a recent glut of new sites that people may not have picked up on previous visits, and don't we know someone in the area that specialises in organising tours of World Heritage Sites, perhaps that could get some specialist access aspects covered?

I'll be honest St Kilda doesn't really float my boat (pun partially intended) Entirely personal, but the amount of time and effort needed, all in my home country, and it probably not being a site the whole family could visit would put me off. Not to say it shouldn't be an option, just that if we go for it I probably wouldn't join, maybe I'll just have an evening or two in Edinburgh.

Bulgaria or Western Turkey sound good to me!

Athos is not easy at all. We have visited the Holy Mountain two years ago in a group of eight. Then we were told that this is the maximum size of a group travelling together they can handle, as the Pilgrims" Office retains daily two places of the Non-Orthodox quota for independent travellers. As far as I remember we exchanged the first emails with the organizer in late February, and got the date for early July.

Western Turkey in much easier. Due to the plummeting tourist arrivals prices are low but the services are still ok. Domestic flights are dirt cheap if you book them early enough. And Aphrodisias is a new site, only few of us have visited it up to now.