UNESCO adds to list of World Heritage Sites
UNESCO has made additions to its list of World Heritage Sites, including volcanoes in Asia and Europe, historic forts in Ukraine and Qatar, and a Basque whaling station in Canada.
At its meeting in Cambodia, the Word Heritage Committee gave the nod to two new areas in North America, the El Pinacate and Gran Desierto de Altar Biosphere in Mexico and the Red Bay Basque Whaling Station in Canada.
In the Sonoran Desert just south of Arizona and north of Puerto Peñasco, El Pinacate is home to an amazing array of natural phenomena, including three volcanic peaks and sand dunes reaching 200 metres high.
Among the black and red lava flows to the east, and the shifting desert sands to the west, live 540 species of plants, 40 species of mammals, 200 of birds, 40 of reptiles.
Ten enormous and almost perfectly circular craters dot the landscape.
In Canada, meanwhile, the list of World Heritage Sites now includes the Red Bay Basque Whaling Station.
Established by Basque mariners in the 1530s at the north-eastern tip of Canada, on the shore of the Strait of Belle Isle, the Arctic maritime base is the most extensive, best preserved and most comprehensive whaling station of its type.
Gran Baya, as it was called, was used as a base for coastal hunting, butchering, and rendering of whale fat.
Used only in the summer months, it was a major source of whale oil, which was shipped to Europe.
The site includes the remains of rendering ovens, wharves, temporary living quarters and a cemetery, together with underwater remains of vessels and whale bone deposits.
By Cheryl Rosen
Cheryl
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