1000 Places to See Before You Die

Don’t get me wrong. I think the concept is 100 percent compelling. And I think some of Patricia’s recommendations—a hot-air balloon ride over the plains of Kenya, the Pushkar camel fair in India, etc.—are spot on.

I just wish the book had been written by a road-weary traveler who has spent—sacrificed, struggled through—twenty years personally tracking down each and every one of these “must see” sites. I suspect that our New York City-based fashion and travel writer has not personally visited more than, say, fifty of the 1,000 places she writes about. I’m happy to be proven wrong. (If she has visited more than 200, I will eat a hat. If she’s ticked off more than 500 on the list I will personally carry her bags and cook her meals on her next trek in Nepal.)

Normally I don’t get this worked up. However a few weeks ago I started seeing television commercials—and billboards and magazine ads—about a new show on the Travel Channel called “1,000 Places to See Before You Die.” The advertisements were omnipresent. They were slick. And they did a good job getting me excited about the show’s USA premiere last month. So I surfed the Travel Channel website and found this:

“Inspired by Patricia Schultz’s best-selling travel book, ‘1,000 Places to See Before You Die’ chronicles the journey of a young couple who put their lives on hold to travel the world for 14 weeks.

Albin and Melanie Ulle, newlyweds from Colorado, experience the vast beauty and diverse cultures of 13 amazing countries and approximately 100 of the 1,000 Places from the book, while unearthing all the local charms and traditions along the way!”

Hang on a second. I was expecting some life-changing description. I was expecting the Travel Channel to throw resources at this idea and to create the definitive television travel experience. Maybe my expectations were unrealistically high. But I can tell you I was not expecting “a young couple who put their lives on hold to travel the world for 14 weeks.”

Fourteen weeks? Are you serious? Fourteen weeks? That’s barely three months. Was this TV show really about a newly married couple who travel the world for fourteen weeks? Because in most parts of the world these are called “honeymoons” and they don’t usually end up on television.