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Travel

Pauline Symaniak, shown here before Volcan Lanin in Argentina, has been pedaling around the earth for 18 months. Much of New Zealand has failed to amaze her.

New Zealand: Too Orderly, Tidy and Tame?

After leaving her job and home to bike around the world, a cyclist finds New Zealand a little too comfortable

The 1507 Johann Ruysch map

The Allure of Nonexistent Places

Long-gone destinations have their own special appeal, don’t you think?

Andrea Ludden's collection of over 40,000 pairs of salt and pepper shakers started completely by chance when Ludden bought a pepper mill at a garage sale in the mid-1980s.

Would You Like Some Salt and Pepper? How About 80,000 Shakers’ Worth?

Over the course of just a couple of decades, the Ludden family has amassed enough novelty shakers to fill two museums

Costa Concordia cruise ship runs aground

Cruise Ship Disaster Arouses Concerns, Memory

The Genoa-based Costa cruise line, owner of the stricken Concordia, has had troubles before

Andrew, bundled against the blazing sun, releases a big brown trout.

Catch and Release: A Wicked Game?

Fishing is an effective means of bringing people to the water’s edge o admire the ecosystem and consider the value in preserving it

Andrew Bland casts for trout during a moment’s peace between passing power boats and jet skis on Lake Wanaka. Mount Aspiring stands in the background, untroubled by the commotion.

Hunting Trout in Haunting Waters

Andrew was sullen, silent and soaked to the skin after spending eight hours in the rain standing in a river waving a stick

Note the shocking price of this basket of fruit at a roadside stand in New Zealand

New Zealand and Other Travel Locales That Will Break the Bank

New Zealand is worth visiting, but I’m not sure how long I can keep traveling here while claiming to be “on the cheap”

Inside the church of San Pedro Apóstol is an ornate gold-leaf altar—earning it the moniker of "The Sistine Chapel of the Andes."

The Sistine Chapel of the Andes

Just miles from Peru’s Incan ruins lie artifacts from another era—beautiful Baroque churches that married Spanish design with indigenous culture

Brushtailed possums, shown here in their native Australia, are among the most destructive pests in New Zealand.

Waging War on Mammals in New Zealand

The family spent days in a cabin eating food, provided by the New Zealand Department of Conservation, which requested to stomp on kiwi-killing vermin

An olive tree in Italy

Italy: Where the Olive Oil is the Most Flavorful

An organic farming network gave my niece the opportunity. Then she gave me the nectar of the gods

Andrew Bland, brother of the author, shivers and shakes after a frigid abalone, or paua, dive in Akaroa Harbour.

Into New Zealand’s Strange Waters and Prehistoric Forests

The absence of native mammals, aside from bats and pinnipeds, gives the impression that New Zealand is still in the age of dinosaurs

Milford Sound, in Fiordland National Park, offers some of New Zealand's most thrilling scenery.

Journey to the Bottom of the Earth – Almost

Anyone would be a fool to visit the South Island and not see the cliffs and marine scenery of Milford Sound

Steve Coogan and Rob Brydon in The Trip

Goofing Around in England’s Lake District

Now out on DVD, The Trip, with comedians Steve Coogan and Rob Brydon, takes the road movie into the storied English countryside

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Where would you go to experience EVOTOURISM?

Where have gone that gave you a new appreciation of evolution? Where would you like to go? What evotourism destinations would you like us to look into?

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EVOTOURISM: Because It’s Time for Travel to Evolve

Journey through the history of life from the Jurassic Coast to the Cradle of Humankind

The La Brea Tar Pits in Los Angeles is the only active urban paleontological excavation site in the United States.

Evotourism ®

Evolution World Tour: La Brea Tar Pits, California

Just a short drive from the mansions of Beverly Hills lies a site where paleontologists have found over three million fossils

The Burgess Shale, a crumbling slope in Canada's Rocky Mountains, has provided our first good look at the rich variety of organisms that once flourished in the region.

Evolution World Tour: Burgess Shale, British Columbia, Canada

Located in the Canadian Rockies, the fossil-rich dig site provides clues to scientists investigating how animal life began

Three-toed horses such as Cormohipparion occidentale were adapted to forests prior to 12 million years ago. As the climate dried, one-toed horses became prevalent.

Evotourism ®

Evolution World Tour: Ashfall Fossil Beds, Nebraska

Prehistoric rhinoceroses and horses died of volcanic ash inhalation 12 million years ago – their fossils are studied now as an example of natural selection

Cristián Samper, evolutionary biologist and the director of Smithsonian's National Museum of Natural History, discusses his favorite evotourism sites.

Cristián Samper on Appreciating Evolution

The director of the Natural History Museum discusses why understanding evolution is so critical

Although he didn’t realize it at the time, friar Gregor Mendel, statue in the Abbey of St. Thomas, had discovered a crucial genetic mechanism underlying natural selection.

Evotourism ®

Evolution World Tour: Mendel’s Garden, Czech Republic

At an abbey in the Czech town of Brno, a friar studied peas and laid the groundwork for modern genetics

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