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View Requirements >- Mali Visa Requirements to Visit the Cliff of Bandiagara
- Get a Brazil Visa to See the Oldest Rock Art in South America
- Get a Vietnamese Visa to Visit the My Son Sanctuary
- Indonesian Visa Requirements to Visit Komodo National Park
- Algerian Visa Requirements to Rock the Casbah
Archive for the ‘World Heritage Site of the Week’ Category
Mali Visa Requirements to Visit the Cliff of Bandiagara
January 2nd, 2011
This week's featured UNESCO World Heritage Site is a stunning, enormous escarpment in Mali. The Cliff of Bandiagara is the sanctuary of the Dogon tribe. Visiting this region, you can see their unique earth buildings and learn about their culture firsthand. The UNESCO website explains:
"The Bandiagara site is an outstanding landscape of cliffs and sandy plateaux with some beautiful architecture (houses, granaries, altars, sanctuaries and Togu Na, or communal meeting-places). Several age-old social traditions live on in the region (masks, feasts, rituals, and ceremonies involving ancestor worship)."
The Dogon people have an interesting history and many secretive traditions that are not supposed to be shared with outsiders. One of the problems with tourism, though, is that it can cheapen
Get a Brazil Visa to See the Oldest Rock Art in South America
December 26th, 2010
This week's featured UNESCO World Heritage Site is one of Brazil's most significant archaeological treasures. Serra da Capivara National Park is home to numerous examples of amazing rock art that dates back to the Ice Age. In fact, one rock shelter has some paintings that date back to 26,000-22,000 BC, making it the oldest known rock art in South America. At over 25,000 years of age, some of the rock art in Serra de Capivara makes the famous cave paintings in Lascaux, France (painted "only" 17,300 years ago) look like modern art.
Serra da Capivara's main draw may be the rock art, but it's also notable for its unique plant and animal life. Some species are not found anywhere else outside of the park boundaries.
UNESCO granted World Heritage status to the park in 1991, calling it an "
Get a Vietnamese Visa to Visit the My Son Sanctuary
December 18th, 2010
This week's featured UNESCO World Heritage is the ruined stronghold of an ancient Vietnamese kingdom. The My Son Sanctuary is the former religious center of the Champa kingdom. Pirates and traders, the Cham people ruled much of the Vietnamese coastline from the 7th century AD to the 15th century, dealing in spices, ivory and aloe. They were frequently at war with their neighbors, the Khmer people of Cambodia and the Viet of Vietnam.
The Champa kingdom was Hindu, and for centuries, Champa rulers built temples in the sheltered valley of My Son. Centuries worth of weather and heavy bombing of the area during the Vietnam War has taken its toll on the ancient temples, but the ruins are still quite impressive. Stick to the designated paths if you visit; land mines and unexploded ordnance rema
Indonesian Visa Requirements to Visit Komodo National Park
December 12th, 2010
At this week's featured UNESCO World Heritage Site, you can see real, live dragons. They may not have wings and they may not breathe fire, but the Komodo dragons of Komodo National Park are still quite fearsome indeed. They can be anywhere from 6 to almost 10 feet long, and are equipped with long claws and sharp teeth perfect for rending flesh. They can swallow a goat whole, and their mouths ooze bloody saliva. Their bite is slightly venomous, but the aggressive pathogenic bacteria in their mouths is even more of a concern.
They've been known to attack humans, and even more frequently to dig up and devour freshly buried bodies. Natives that live near them used to sacrifice goats to them to ensure peaceful coexistence, and the dragons have become more aggressive since outside environmen
Algerian Visa Requirements to Rock the Casbah
December 5th, 2010
This week's featured UNESCO World Heritage Site is located in Algeria. Algeria's Casbah is the oldest part of the city of Algiers. It has been inhabited since at least the 6th century BC, and in the 16th century it was the capital of the famous Muslim pirate Khair-al-Din, otherwise known as "Barbarossa" or Redbeard. According to Lonely Planet, Barbarossa took control of the city after the people, sick and tired of their Spanish overlords trying to convert them to Christianity, declared themselves subjects of the Ottoman Empire and begged him to throw the Spanish out and claim the city for the Sultan.
Built on a hill that overlooks the sea, the city today is mostly residential. Although Algiers is planning to restore the area, many, many of the buildings are in disrepair and the area i
