visiting UNESCO World Heritage sites

What do Casa Batlló (a funky modernist house designed by Gaudí in the early 1900s) and the Pantheon (a Roman temple built in 126 AD) have in common?¹ They are both listed among UNESCO World Heritage sites.

The World Heritage List includes 890 properties forming part of the cultural and natural heritage which the World Heritage Committee considers as having outstanding universal value.

Having been provoked to investigate the question by a comment on my last post, I found myself going further down the rabbit hole to look carefully through the list. I observed that I have visited far more such sites than I had realized.

Those places listed were among the most memorable places–dramatic, intriguing, charming or downright awe-inspiring– that I have been to in my life. I would gladly return to any of them.

What’s more, many of the places that are on my mental list of places to visit before I die are on that list: the Taj Mahal, the Great Wall, the pyramids of Egypt, to name a few. Still other places I recognized from the travel tales and photos of my mother and grandmother–places I would love to visit as well.

All of these things have made me realize what an incredible resource this list is. I now have it in my head that in the years to come, I will expressly make efforts to visit more sites on the list. I’m going to consider this a grand checklist of wonders of the world.

Below I have listed the sites that I have been to so far. I count that I have visited 24 sites in 9 countries.

How about you? Have you been to any World Heritage sites? Are there places on the list that you long to visit?

UNESCO Word Heritage Sites I have visited²

United States

  • Mesa Verde National Park: This was one of our regular haunts of summer camping trips with my grandmother and sister.
  • Grand Canyon National Park: I went there on a separate camping trip with just my grandmother, when I was a teenager. (I can’t remember the year.)

Japan: I visited Japan in 2004. I went to a conference in Nara, and stayed a few days in Kyoto as well. (I want to go back.)


Heian Shrine in Kyoto.


The giant Buddha in Nara.

Brazil: I visited these sites in 1991, during my semester abroad as an undergrad.

United Kingdom

  • Tower of London: I know I went there when I was 9 years old, but have little memory. I also revisited the Tower in 2005 with John.
  • City of Bath: visited in 2005


At the Roman Baths in Bath.

France: I lived in France for 2 years, though they weren’t consecutive years. The first was in 1980, the second in 1988. Some of the sites here were visited during the first year, some the second. More recently, I visited Paris and Versailles in 2007.


A view of the Seine showing Notre Dame.

Germany

  • Völklingen Ironworks: John, Phoebe and I headed here as an excursion from Saarbrücken, during our stay there for a conference in 2007. It was an amazing place, and I would love to return there with more time to explore and photograph. (I posted some photos from that trip before.)


The Völklingen Ironworks as seen from the train station in Völklingen.

Switzerland

  • Swiss Alps Jungfrau-Aletsch*: I’m not sure whether or not to count this one. I visited Switzerland with my mother on our European trip of 1984, but I don’t remember exactly where we went. I do know we saw some Alps, though…

Italy: I have been to Italy two times. The first time was in 1984, on a trip around Europe by train with my mother. We visited Florence and Venice. The second time was in 1988, when I travelled with a high school friend. We went to Rome and Florence by bus (from France), and stopped in Pisa as well.

Spain
My trip to Spain was just this past September (2009). (I want to go back.)


Columns in the Park Güell in Barcelona.


Details from inside Alcázar in Sevilla.

——–
¹ Aside from being 2 of Sally’s favorite buildings on earth, that is.

² Places marked by an asterisk are those where either I have not been to every monument within a listing, or where I am not certain whether the particular location I visited falls within a region listed.³

³ I haven’t been to the Historic Centre of Brugge, but I did just recently see the movie In Bruges, which makes me feel a bit like I’ve been there. (Or at least like I’d like to go there…)

images: These are photos I took on various trips since 2004. One of these days I hope to unearth and scan photos from my trips before the days of digital cameras…

on my way back to the parking lot

These photos are of the Stata Center at MIT, designed by Frank Gehry. I work next door, and tend to cut through the lobby when my path takes me that general direction. Today, I wandered down the stairs and headed out via the third floor terrace on my way back to my car after work.

removing the elephant

In case you haven’t followed the news about my nephew Diego on my sister’s blog, I’m very happy to report that the surgery went well. The surgeons were able to remove the tumor, which, by the way, was the size of a football. In the belly of a 3-year-old. And a not particularly large 3-year-old at that.

Thank you for all of your positive thoughts and prayers. The support really meant a lot to me and to my sister. While the scariest part is hopefully behind us now, the recovery process and treatment will continue to be hard. So, your ongoing support will also be gratefully accepted.

I feel that an enormous weight has been lifted now. It’s like that elephant that was standing on the anvil squishing my brain has stepped off. The weight of the anvil feels much more manageable now. I’m not sure the elephant’s entirely left the room, but his presence is less heavy now.

I know it seems rather self-absorbed to reflect on how this has affected me, compared to what my sister and brother-in-law and mother (who is also out in California) have gone through. But what’s a personal blog for if not self-absorption?

The last few weeks have been exhausting, even for me. I’ve been startled by how physically the worry has affected me. I have come to understand intimately the expression “worry oneself sick.” I had low levels of nausea virtually non-stop from the day Diego was first admitted to the hospital. My appetite was suppressed, yet I found myself eating anyhow. I have eaten far more chocolate the last few weeks than is quite good for me. I know this just contributed to feeling run-down. (Eating sugar has that effect on me.)

Remarkably, the timing of all of this worry exactly corresponded to our transition to new sleep arrangements. That Friday that my nephew went into the hospital was the day that I had determined would be the day we’d move Theo into Phoebe’s room. I found myself wanting a baby to snuggle with that night, but all the plans were in place. I’ve mentioned that the transition has gone well, overall. What I hadn’t mentioned was that in spite of no longer having my sleep disrupted by Theo, I haven’t felt particularly more well-rested.

And of course I know that all of my worry pales in comparison to that experienced by my sister, my brother-in-law, and my mother, who have experienced their worry and concern for Diego in a much more immediate and visceral way.

It’s been tough to be so far away from my family with all of this going on. The country feels entirely too large, and I find myself resentful of the distance between the coasts.

Image compiled from public domain images found at wpclipart.

what’s been weighing on my mind

Just over 3 weeks ago, my 3-year-old nephew, my sister’s older son, was diagnosed with cancer. He’s got a very large tumor on his kidney. The “good” news is that it was determined to be a very treatable kind, a Wilms tumor, with a very high rate of survival (90%). While we are very optimistic, things continue to be uncertain from day-to-day. (And sometimes even from hour to hour. I have learned today that my nephew will go in for surgery this afternoon.)

My sister started a blog to share updates, and she has given me permission to share the link. She has been very eloquently describing the emotional roller-coaster that has been this past few weeks.

We would greatly appreciate your positive thoughts, emotional support and/or prayers. All denominations and belief systems gladly accepted.

The April Just Posts

The April Just Posts:

The posts of this month’s roundtable were nominated by:

If you have a post in the list above, or would just like to support the Just Posts, we invite you to display a button on your blog with a link back here, or to the Just Posts at Cold Spaghetti. If you would like to have a post included next month, you can find out how to submit posts and all sorts of other stuff about the Just Posts at the information page.

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off the top of my head

Hi! Remember me? Wow, it’s been ages since we last talked. It seems like years. Has it really been only a couple weeks? What have you been up to? Yeah? Man, I had no idea they could do that. With gouda even? Seriously, I’m constantly amazed by the power of cheese. I was thinking about you earlier today when I was going about my business. No, not that business. Sheesh. No, I think I was driving or ironing toilet paper or staring at my toes, or whatever it is that I do most of the time. It was getting close to lunch time, and I had this intense craving for ramen noodles. Which naturally led to me thinking about brains. And then zombies. Then mummies. And then dust bunnies. And then Welsh rabbit. So naturally I couldn’t help but remember that time when you got caught with the…ha ha ha, yeah. We totally don’t need to go there. Oh, you already went there. Again? Did they recognize you without your…Oh. Sorry about that. Didn’t mean to bring up such a sore subject. Right, right. I understand. Beach balls and ninjas. Say no more. Well, I’d better go. I have a lot of stuff I need to do. There’s a whole pile of lentils that I need to alphabetize. Good talkin’ with ya.

—

So, um, yeah. It’s been a while. Things have been crazy. Here’s a few things that I could write lots more about, except I should probably sleep instead:

    • We finally moved Theo into Phoebe’s room a couple of weeks ago. It’s been going really well.

    • I’m heading to Chicago next week for a conference. Solo.

    • I have a lot of stuff to do before I leave.

    • My poison ivy is still healing, over 4 full weeks after initial exposure.

    • Phoebe started preschool this week, and Theo started going to daycare 5 days a week. (Phoebe will be at the preschool 3 days, and at the old daycare with Theo two days.) This new schedule will give me 2 more days a week to do my work. Or alphabetize lentils.

    • I’m not really getting into Twitter. My romance with Facebook is flagging. I’m considering breaking up with both and taking up smoke signals.

    • I’d really hoped to resume last year’s “merry merry month of metablogging” this May. But seeing as I have so much going on, I probably won’t manage.

    • There are other weightier things on my brain that I can’t get into here. Imagine, if you will, my cartoon brain with a large cartoon anvil on top. Now put a cartoon elephant on top.

    • Finally, here’s a picture of Theo as a little baby with an octopus on his head. Actually, I don’t really have a lot to say about this.

Oh, and one more final last thing. Can you identify this movie quote?

When you can balance a tack hammer on your head, you will head off your foes with a balanced attack.

I have nothing clever to say at this time

You know, I hate it when I go a long time without really posting. I feel this sort of weird pressure that whatever I post after a lull should somehow sparkle. Be…worthwhile. So I end up thinking a lot about posts I’d like to write, things I’ve been composing in my head for ages. But by the end of the day, when I have a chance to sit down, I’m just tired. I don’t feel like I have sufficient time and energy to write something that I want to write. I might get part way through a draft of a post, and then give up and go to bed. So, once again, I’m writing something utterly dull.