Skip to main content

The attraction

It might be a grand building or a rustic shack, a world class gallery or a tiny museum of something obscure, a huge monument or small plaque by the side of the road, but if you want them to come you need an attraction.


You might sometimes wonder how some attractions could ever draw tourists to a place. Many would never warrant a special trip. But I've come to realise that they don't just exist for that purpose. An attraction doesn't just exist to draw tourists into a place, it also gives them a place to be.

Without a tourist attraction a place exists only for itself. A visitor will always wonder at their welcome, if their presence is an invasion of the privacy of the locals. An attraction is an offering to the visitor. Stop here, stay awhile. This spot is yours and mine.

It doesn't matter if it is interesting, fun or beautiful or not. All that matters is that it is.

Comments

Popular posts from this blog

My first overseas trip: Singapore and Malaysia

I've always loved to travel. My first memory is of sitting in a an aircraft, aged 18 months or so. Yet I never believed that I could travel overseas. To me, it seemed like something you did when you retired, or if you were rich. That all changed when I met B. She had not only travelled overseas, she was from overseas . B was born in Malaysia and arrived in Australia, with her family, in 1988. She still had relatives and friends in Malaysia and Singapore and she, along with the remainder of her family, planned to return for a visit during the Australian summer of 1995. At the time I was staying in B's mother's house while we were studying at university. After B's father passed away the year before I was the nominal "man" of the house and its high maintenance garden; her brother Michael was studying up in Queensland. B and I were quite inseparable and her mother kindly offered to pay for me to join them on their vacation. So it was that I obtained my very firs...

Down the Oito Line

Riding the length of the Oito Line from Itoigawa to Shinjuku (well, Matsumoto, really, but you might as well go the whole way) has long been a dream of mine. It suddenly gained urgency when I read that the last length of it between Itoigawa to Minami-Otari would be closed once the Hokuriku Shinkansen to Kanazawa and Toyama opens by next year. Now, as mentioned last time, B and Alex are among those that would much rather catch the very fast Shinkansen, but in the end she decided to follow me, despite the very early morning. We rode the Hokuetsu Express from Toyama to Itoigawa, completing a little more of that West Coast for me. Though the coastal stretch was short there were some nice views at times. I should like to see more of Itoigawa one day, explore its geology. But now we had to quickly cross over the platform bridge to catch our train to Minami-Otari. To my great delight it was a KiHa 120 railcar, my favourite. I felt a degree of sadness standing up at the front...