Most exotic tourist spot

Until today I had thought that it might be Antarctica or the Aral Sea, but there’s a new contender: the Great Pacific Garbage Patch.

A looming environmental threat the size of Texas should be hard to miss, but when that threat is floating in a rarely-visited section of the Pacific Ocean and composed of a diffuse mass of plastic, it’s easy for it to avoid public attention. The recent establishment of a marine preserve north of the Hawaiian Islands has refocused attention on this floating refuse heap, which has picked up the moniker the Great Pacific Garbage Patch.

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10 thoughts on “Most exotic tourist spot”

  1. I dunno – I’m not going to think of this as an exotic tourist spot until there’s at least three or four decent resort hotels there and JTB starts offering tours. At the moment I doubt there is even one decent Hilton or Nikko hotel on the entire Patch. And what about a proper DFS Shoppers? They have that branch at Amundsen Base (in the new ANA Nankyoku Hotel and Spa) so why not here?

  2. Not to the Japanese.

    (And yes, I am aware that is a blatant stereotype and that there are many Japanese far far more adventurous than I am, but I can’t help thinking of travel brochures for “Exotic Asia” that feature such recherché destinations as Hong Kong….)

  3. OK, those are respectably exotic destinations. Still, call me when JTB has a Polar Tour.

  4. Obviously I should have checked the web page before I spoke. I must admit, I am impressed.

    Curzon and I actually considered a trip to the Aral Sea a few years ago, when we met up at our friend’s place in Almaty, Kazakhstan. Still interested?

  5. Did I kill this blog, or have all the authors signed up on for that luxury Aral Sea cruise?

  6. Well, I spent all of last week being extremely sick, and I’m going to spend this week cramming for the GRE math section, which mostly consists of crap I haven’t done in a decade.

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