Tim Leffel’s Cheapest Destinations

Rankings of UNESCO World Heritage Sites

Here’s a news flash for you: rich countries take better care of their UNESCO World Heritage Sites than poor countries do.

This past summer I was asked to participate in a National Geographic panel discussing the state of UNESCO World Heritage sites. Hundreds of experts ranked ones they had been to in the last two years in terms of how well they were being taken care of and we were able to comment on what was good or bad about the situation. The results are in and there is an excellent rundown in the current National Geographic Traveler. It’s worth picking up the print issue to get the details and see lots of great photos, but there’s a taste of it online here: Best, Worst World Heritage Sites Ranked.

The “wisdom of crowds” theory seems to hold here, with the rankings being in line with what most keen-eyed visitors would expect. Siem Reap is in big trouble. The state of the once-pristine Galapagos Islands of Ecuador is deteriorating due to declining care for the environment. (The islands had the worst decline on the list.) The very bottom score went to the incredibly polluted Kathmandu Valley of Nepal. The price of progress wed with zero emission controls. Potala Palace in Tibet was close to the bottom, the site becoming a sad Disneyesque joke under authoritarian Chinese rule.
Most of the top-ranked sites are in countries with a wealthy, educated populace that understands the benefits of good stewardship and takes pride in the results. The top sites are in places like Norway, Spain, and New Zealand. Despite some local grumbing in Guanajuanto that preservation isn’t being enforced like it should be, this historical Mexican city jumped up to #5 on the list.

Next time you have to cough up a high fee to visit Petra, Machu Picchu, or the Taj Mahal, keep in mind that these sites need all the help they can get to keep from deteriorating. These are treasures we need to preserve and as travelers, we are both the problem and the solution.