Golf© fevisyu
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This week saw the most buzz about tourism opportunities in North Korea since, as far as I can tell, pretty much ever. First, from the New York Times, came an article about new cruises being offered by the Dear Leader:
Desperate for foreign currency, officials in secretive North Korea are trying to lure tourists to holiday cruises along the length of the impoverished country’s east coast. Earlier this month, a trial run by the rusty Mangyongbong was completed in 43 trying hours at sea. More than 200 people were packed into dim and musty cabins, sometimes eight to a room with floor mattresses. Chinese tourists and businesspeople shared quarters with North Korean officials and foreign journalists.
I hope Carnival Cruises is paying attention — here comes competition!
Then, from CNN, comes news that British travel agent Dylan Harris has linked up with the North Korean government to host a series of amateur golf tournaments in the DPRK:
Harris hatched a plan to get more people interested in traveling to the last Stalinist enclave on earth: by setting up North Korea’s very first international amateur golf championship…the inaugural 2011 DPRK Amateur Golf Open
As you might expect, this isn’t your everyday suburban golf experience.
So severe were the out of bounds — a bi-product of being built next to a military firing range — that many found it difficult to stay on the course from one hole to the next.
Cruises and golf: the quintessential North Korean experience.