World Wonders III

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Travel Pictures | 7 New Wonders

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World Wonders Tour Operators offering travel to the countries with the best ancient sites are here:
World Wonders Tour Operators

Rapa Nui [Easter Island], Chile. Rapa Nui, also known as Easter Island, is a distant, little developed South Pacific island containing a couple of thousand inhabitants and hundreds of enigmatic stone statues known as moai.
Although owned by Chile - 2,300 miles away - most of the people are of Polynesian extraction. This is a bleak, bizarre, stunning experience, and there's a great beach too.
3 or 4 days is probably enough for this world wonder though clouds and rain are common any time of year so if pictures are your thing give yourself time to get sunny shots from the right angle.
Best: Sept - April [summertime] but OK most of the year. Avoid: May [wettest month] and June-August [crowds], if possible. See Easter Island Pictures Chile | Chile Travel Guide

Kyoto & Nara, Japan, picture top right. Japan's old capital, with thousands of vast and clever temples, Zen gardens and ancient tea houses, but be warned, there are plenty of hideous buildings and traffic jams in Kyoto, so wear your culture-only blinkers. Best: March - May, Oct - Nov. Avoid: June-August [rains, heat, humidity]. See Japan Travel Guide | Kyoto Pictures | Japan Map

Palmyra, Syria. Palmyra is a spacious and spectacular 1,800 year old ruined city in the middle of nowhere. Also check out Damascus, Syria's capital, with an old and decaying town centre that is charming and well endowed with the flower of Islamic architecture, as well as the epitome of Arab bazaars.
Best: March-May, Sept-Nov. Avoid winter [cold and wet] and mid-summer [extreme heat] and maybe Ramadan [Muslim fasting month, Sept 24 - Oct 22 '06; Sept 13 - Oct 11 '07; Sept 1 - Sept 29 '08]. See Syria Travel Guide | Syria Pictures | Syria Map

Persepolis & Isfahan, Iran. Persepolis is a huge and well ruined place, but still packed with stupendous tombs, palaces, sculptures and friezes - a pictorial inventory of the Persian Empire over 2,000 years ago, and all in an arid but picturesque location near Shiraz. Isfahan, about 300km [200m] north of Shiraz, is a relaxed and friendly city, contains a marvellous collection of grand and colourful architecture from the last 1,000 years, mostly mosques, but also gardens, a cathedral, a palace and much more.
Best: April-June, Sept, Oct. Avoid: winter [very cold], and maybe Ramadan [Muslim fasting month, Sept 1 - 29 2008].

Cappadocia, Turkey. This wacky landscape pimpled with fairy chimneys is more of a geological wonder than a man made one, although men - mostly persecuted Christians - ingeniously tunneled homes into these rocky erections for hundreds of years. The area is quiet, the ambience fantastic, local wines are tasty, walks or bike rides unearthly and then there are the hot air baloons...if you can afford it, an air trip is well worth the crack.
Cappadocia is on UNESCO's list of Natural World Heritage Properties, and Goreme town is the hub of the action.
Getting there: Fly from Istanbul to Kayseri, then it's about 45 minutes' drive to Cappadocia. Neither buses nor dolmus [Turkish minibuses] are very convenient and mostly go to Nevsehir. e.g. Cappadocia is 2 hours from Kayseri, 6 hours from Ankara, 12 hours from Istanbul. If you can stump up for a hire car or scooter that is definitely the best plan.
Best: May-Sept. Avoid: Nov-March [cold and damp]. Cappadocia Pictures | Turkey Travel Guide | Turkey Map

Borobudur, Java, Indonesia, picture top left. A massive, pyramid shaped Buddhist temple from the 9th century, with a thousand Buddhas surveying the surrounding greenery, and superb carvings around many walls, surpassingly intact. Also, not far away is Prambanan, another impressive religious complex, but this one is Hindu.
Near is Yogyakarta, a calm and attractive town specialising in batik, unlike Jakarta which is a sweaty and unpleasant megatropolis.
Best: Apr-June, Sept, Oct. Avoid: Dec and Jan [wet]; July, Aug. [crowded, expensive, & possible smoke/haze problem. See Indonesia Travel Guide | Indonesia Pictures | Indonesia Map

Stonehenge, England. A group of enormous megaliths [shaped stones] dating from 2,950 BC, Stonehenge was possibly a calendar and centre for religious rituals, or a royal family burial tomb, or something else entirely, and preceded by a ring of wooden totems from about 3100BC.
Phyical access to the stones is not permitted [due to potential vandalism] except on midsummer night [the Summer Solstice, June 20-21] or by permission from the English Heritage organisation [www.english-heritage.org.uk].
The site is couple of hours southwest of London by car, near Salisbury, and near some other prehistoric sites, e.g. the Avebury Stone Circle [better in some ways because you can touch the stones], Old Sarum neolithic fort, Silbury Hill and many giant White Horses cut into the turf of various chalk hillsides. All this and crop circles too in the summer time - with alien assistance.
Also, not far away in the adjacent county of Dorset is the magnificent iron-age fort Maiden Castle, and the naughty but nice Cerne Giant. Best: May-Sept. Avoid Oct - Feb [grey, damp and short days]. Stonehenge Pictures and information | England Pictures | UK Travel Guide | UK Tourist Map

Runner up world wonders: Pueblo Bonito [Chaco Canyon complex], New Mexico; Shatrunajaya Mountain, Gujarat, India.

World Wonders Tour Operators offering travel to the countries with the best ancient sites are here:
World Wonders Tour Operators

To view the best wonders of the world for each month according to the local climate go to:
January | February | March | April | May | June | July | August | Sept | Oct | Nov | Dec