This is part two of my series on Unique Travel Experiences. Some of these are beautiful, others strange, and some might find some of them kinda gross, including this first one.

Sour toe cocktail

I’m sure a few of you remember last year when a small town in the Yukon, a Territory in Northern Canada, uhm…. lost an important relic? Let me take you back a bit, it’s the 1920’s and brothers Louie and Otto Linken have gotten caught in a blizzard while rum running, which is exactly what you think it is, people who smuggle alcohol into places where it’s prohibited, like Canada in the 1920s.

Louie put his foot through some ice and his foot got soaked. By the time the brothers got back to their cabin, Louie’s right foot was frozen SOLID, and I’m guessing you can see where this is going, but it takes a turn… To prevent Gangrene, which can be deadly, Otto cut off Louie’s toe and put it in a jar of alcohol to keep for some reason… after that what happened is a bit of a legend, but the story is that a man named Captain Dick Stevenson found the toe in 1976, in a remote cabin with the toe still in the jar of alcohol.

Now I’m sure you’re thinking “how is this a unique experience?! It’s just a story of how a guy lost his toe and how another guy found it” Well… The reason why its an experience, is because there’s now a club associated with the toe…

So, after finding the toe, our friend Captain Dick Stevenson founded the Sourtoe Cocktail Club, and it has only ONE requirement… Potential members must drink The Sourtoe Cocktail. It’s nothing fancy, just whiskey (usually Yukon Jack) with the mummified toe in it. You can drink it any way you’d like, but to join the toe must touch your lips. And if you think that’s gross, in 2013 there was a guy who swallowed the toe, on purpose. He was run out of town, charged 500$ and the fine was upped to 2500$… and in case you were wondering, they have more than one toe, and the ‘toe’ has been stolen and swallowed, and is apparently worth 80 Thousand dollars!

Sunrise and sunset at Uluru are jaw-dropping in so many ways. The sunset viewing area is a bit of a distance away, and that allows you to see the change in colour around Uluru, first a little at a time, then all at once. The sunrise is best seen (at least in my opinion) up close. The best way to do that is to do the walk around at sunrise. Seeing just how massive Uluru is up close is mind blowing and then watching the rock change colours is stunning. If you’re lucky enough to visit after it rains, some portions look like waterfalls with water pouring off the rock in pathways caved through the millennia. I usually include places you can visit similar phenomena’s, but Uluru is pretty unique and I have yet to find anything similar. At the end of this year Climbing with officially be banned at Uluru and is currently heavily discouraged, since it holds such high cultural importance and because of the number of people who have died in the attempt, most of which was due to heart attacks.

Sand Dunes

Tasmania was the first place I saw massive sand dune was in Tasmania. We pulled up to the parking area and the massive dune was all we could see on that side, at almost a hundred feet tall at its highest point, it seemed to have gone on forever.

Climbing up was a feat even for me, with the wet sand collapsing under our feet as we climbed but when we got to the top, I was even more shocked at how far it went. It looked like a photo out of a brochure for Egyptian tourism. There are some places with trees and other greenery, but most of what I saw was just sand. The walk down was almost as difficult, but for a different reason, this time staying up was the issue, with sliding down quickly being an issue for all of us.

Many people slide down on sleds or cardboard boxes, and go up using ATVs and drive around the summit on them, we only stayed a few minutes, maybe 45 minutes total, compared to the hours I would have happily stayed for.

Other places you can find massive sand dunes like this one include Athabasca Sand Dunes and Great Sand Hills both in Saskatchewan, Grand Sand Dunes in Colorado, White Sands in New Mexico (the same from Brad Pitt’s GQ Style photoshoot), Imperial sand dunes in California, Bruneau Sand Dunes in Idaho, Dune of Pilat in western France and even in Wales.

Mirror lakes

This is an image I took of Lake Matheson in New Zealand… It is easily my favourite place in the world. These stunning views are at a mirror lake. The water is so still that it perfectly reflects the mountains and sky. There are a bunch of these lakes around the world, and I would recommend getting there early so you can see it with the sun rising and with very few people there to block the view or disturb the water, animals like birds can disturb the water too, so you want to get there and get your pictures before they arrive.

If New Zealand is a little out of your budget or time constraints, you can find mirror lakes in Alberta at Herbert Lake, as well as in California, Lake Braies in Italy to name a few, but if you get the chance, I really recommend Lake Matheson.

China’s forbidden city to open for the first time in 2020

This is one I can honestly say NO ONE has ever done. Built between 1771 and 1776 for the retirement of Emperor Qianlong, the Forbidden City has largely been unused since 1924, that will all change in 2020 when it opens to the public. What is opening is actually the garden, which will be finished in time to coincide the 600th anniversary of the forbidden city, which you can currently visit, but not in its entirety. A few sites say that tickets are on sale, but I haven’t found them, but based on the current price of 40-60 yuan (about 8-12 CAD)for the Palace Museum depending on the time of year, I can’t imagine it will be a budget-breaking experience, however they have capped daily numbers at a staggering 80 THOUSAND people per day, so buying in advance and planning your trip is highly recommended since the whole area is over 2 acres.