Don’t be that stupid: the top 10 tourists on holidays

This picture is very shocking, isn’t it? In September 2015, the Costa Rican Ministry of the Environment reported on its Facebook page that hundreds of tourists got in the way of the turtles and many of them returned to the sea without laying their eggs. Protected by only two park wardens, the area was invaded by ignorant tourists who had ventured into it without a licensed guide, which is illegal, especially since they invaded critical points generally prohibited to the public. Tourist guide associations and communities are now demanding more help from the authorities and better controls.

At a depth of 400 metres in the heart of a crater, adventurers Simon Turner and Bradley Ambrose were able to take this crazy picture. In an interview, Simon Turner said that “It was a fantastic, incredible experience, I felt like I was on Mars.” What you still need to know is that doing such a thing is super dangerous; even with fire-resistant clothing, a volcano’s temperature remains at 1093°C, which melts absolutely everything in its path.

2012, Brisbane, Australia. Two British men, respectively 20 and 21 years old, come back drunk from a beach party. Obviously having no further judgment, they entered Sea World and decided to go swimming with the penguins. Having consumed a litre and a half of vodka (according to their own words), they did not stop there. They emptied a fire extinguisher into the shark tank and removed a penguin to bring it back as a souvenir. Like the protagonists of the film Hangover waking up with a tiger in their hotel room, these two stupid tourists had woken up with a penguin. Fortunately, they were fined $1,000 AUS.

In 2016, a small dolphin got lost on Santa Teresa Beach in Buenos Aires. A normal and sane person would have kindly helped the dolphin to find the water, but not the tourists who were on the beach that day. Instead, they decided to take him out of the water, take him and make selfies with him! Accidentally, during their ridiculous photo shoot, some children even pressed the animal’s vent, which is of vital importance to it to breathe. After 15 minutes of serving as a mascot for selfish and self-centred tourists, the dolphin died of dehydration.

One of the wonderful things about travelling is to see and visit some of the most impressive historical monuments. When you go to Rome, a must stop is certainly the Colosseum, this ancient Roman amphitheatre, one of the best known and most visited in the world. However, a basic rule to follow when visiting such a place is obviously to remain respectful towards this historical plot. However, not everyone obviously understands that vandalism is unacceptable. This is the case, for example, of a French tourist who, in February 2017, decided to engrave her name in the Coliseum stone, but that does not include the two Brazilians who, a few months earlier, broke into the monument, then the Russian, the two Americans and the Austrian who thought it was appropriate to immortalize themselves on the building stones.

When travelling, it is not uncommon to throw a coin into a well or a fountain, for example, for luck, but throwing a coin into an aircraft turbine is unconventional, to say the least. A plane leaving Shanghai had to be delayed for several hours in June 2017 after a Japanese woman threw a total of nine coins into the turbine of China Southern Airlines flight CZ380. The 80-year-old lady generally missed her target, but one of her nine coins still managed to fit into the turbine. Imagine the consequences that this could have had if no one had witnessed his action and the plane had taken off as planned!

Decency seems to have become a meaningless concept for some people nowadays. This probably explains why two American sisters were driven out of Cambodia in February 2015, after taking selfies of themselves, or rather their buttocks, naked in the sacred temple of Angkor Wat. The two women, in addition to being deported, had to pay a significant fine and were sentenced to six months in prison.

People are sometimes willing to do anything to take the best selfie possible, even if it involves risking their lives. This is the case, for example, of an Australian couple who, visiting the Portuguese seaside resort of Ericeira in June 2018, decided to climb the 40-metre high wall surrounding the rocky bay. At the time of taking his picture, the couple dropped the cell phone and fell after it while trying to catch it, to finish his descent on the beach of Dos Pescadores. Obviously, such an accident should not happen because the wall is there to protect tourists, but when they decide to climb it, no one can do anything for them. Other accidents of this kind have already happened, such as the case of Colleen Burns who fell 122 metres into a gorge in the Grand Canyon trying to make way for a man who wanted to do a selfie, or the German tourist who climbed a security fence to take a selfie in front of the Inca ruins of Machu Picchu, but who lost his footing and finished his descent a hundred metres below.

Everyone knows that in a plane, we keep quiet, we go about our business and, above all, we don’t open any doors! But apparently, this rule was forgotten by a Chinese man in September 2014 on a flight from Hangzhou to Chengdu in China. While waiting for takeoff, the man wanted to take to the air, so he triggered a security alert by opening one of the aircraft’s emergency exits. Fortunately, this passenger’s stupidity caused no damage and could be easily overcome.

Nowadays, thanks to the powerful cell phones available on the market, we can take beautiful pictures at any time without having to drag a big camera. However, when on safari, for example, it is better to keep a little discomfort on the selfie side with wild animals, for our own safety. There have always been a few reckless people who wanted to pet a lion in the wild, but now people are willing to risk their lives for a selfie. There are even some zoos, mainly in Asia and South America, that offer the opportunity to take a picture with a wild animal to increase their income! Admittedly, animals are generally drugged to be more docile and less dangerous (which is not a good thing either!), but the danger persists!

Source: tipps-zum-reisen