Well, I don’t know about hotspots, per se, but this Salon slideshow of “the world’s most beautiful wastelands” makes a compelling argument for why travelers and adventurers might enjoy scrambling over eroded walls and darting across dusty plazas. These places all used to mean a lot to the people who lived in them, and now they’re crumbling into nothingness. They served different functions but now just take up space. They’re a visual reminder of our transience, a melancholy ode to human achievement and fragility. Like stumbling across Atlantis on land.
The splendor of days gone by in Detroit
Photo by Albert Duce, from http://www.salon.com/life/feature/2011/07/10/trazzler_slideshow_beautiful_wastelands/slideshow.html
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Have you read “The World Without Us” by Alan Weisman? It could be characterized as travel writing as much as environmental non-fiction. To explore the question of what would happen to Earth (and what human artifacts would remain) if people were to suddenly go extinct, Weisman visits several famously once-inhabited locales, such as the Korean Demilitarized Zone, Chernobyl, and the former UN buffer zone in Cyprus. I listened to it on CD, but I think it would be a quick read.
I haven’t read it, but I have heard of it. It sounds fascinating, and I’ll add it to my Goodreads. Thanks, Pam!
Pretty words >> “They’re a visual reminder of our transience, a melancholy ode to human achievement and fragility. Like stumbling across Atlantis on land.”
Aw, thanks.