When you get tired of ordinary vacation stuff like buffets and beaches, why not check out something new—like shootouts, cesspits, and the U.S. Border Patrol?
PARIS SEWER TOUR
There aren’t many tours that begin with the question, “Everyone have their nose plugs?” But starting in 1867, tourists in Paris could take a stinky boat ride on an underground river of moldy cheese, half-eaten baguettes, cigarette butts, and…other stuff. Sadly, the boat tours were put to an end in 1975, but today, for only $3 U.S., you can take a walk through the Paris Sewer Museum, which covers 500 yards of the city’s 1,300-mile-long sewer system. From the top of a metal grate, you get a bird’s eye view of the sewage itself. But that’s not all—you’ll also see the tools of the trade, including a “flusher trolley,” a “two-ball traveling cleaner,” a gas mask, and the new state-of-the-art computer monitoring system. At the end of this “tour of doody,” you can go to the restroom to really be part of the action.
To take this tour, you’ll have to travel 700 miles south of the U.S./Mexico border to Parque EcoAlberto, a park owned by the Hñahñu Indians in the state of Hidalgo. For about $18, you and your “fellow immigrants” (actors) take a four-hour nighttime trek through the desert over steep hills and across dry river beds until you reach the (fake) U.S. border. All the while, “border-patrol” officers (more actors) chase you and shoot guns loaded with blanks. Your mission: to reach the “U.S. border” first, at which point the guards swear at you in Spanish before giving you a ride back to where you started.
In 1884 and ’85, a serial killer terrorized the streets of Austin, Texas, raping and murdering nine people, many of them servant girls. Though several suspects were arrested, no one was convicted, and the real “Servant Girl Annihilator” was never found. This 90-minute tour will take you to every spot where a victim’s body was discovered. However, none of the victims’ houses are still standing, so the tour is basically a grisly history lesson while you look at empty lots. Price: $15.
Costa Rican baseball factory workers earn about $2,500 a year. Average MLB player: $2.5 million.
A popular new tourism trend in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, and other South American cities is “reality tours,” where visitors trek though slums and shantytowns. One of the first of these “poorism” trips is the Favela Tour through Rio’s largest shantytown, Rocinha. Organizer Marcelo Armstrong says it will be an “illuminating experience if you look for an insider point of view.” Visitors can see armed men who work as guards for drug traffickers, but the tour is mostly an opportunity to help the local economy by shopping at neighborhood markets and food stalls.
“It’s a terrible idea. Is it worth that thrill for 65 bucks?” asks Los Angeles City Councilman Dennis Zine, who doesn’t understand why anyone would willingly travel into the most dangerous neighborhoods in L.A. “There’s a fascination with gangs,” counters Alfred Lomas, former member of the Florencia 13 gang, who started L.A. Gangland Tours in 2010. But it’s more than just a way to spend a Saturday afternoon; Lomas says that he wants the public to see that the “mean streets” are not as mean as they might think (although passengers must sign a waiver absolving L.A. Gangland Tours of any liability should they get hit by a stray bullet). “We can either create awareness and discuss the positive things that go on in these communities,” said Lomas, “or we can try to sweep it under the carpet.” After paying, you’ll board an unmarked charter bus and head out past the graffiti-covered walls of skid row, passing such landmarks as the Central Jail and the L.A. River (where Terminator 2 was filmed). Then you’ll travel to the Florence-Firestone neighborhood, the birthplace of the Crips. The tour is conducted by tattooed former gang members—who take extra care not to upset current gang members. “We ain’t saying, ‘Look at them Crips, look at them Bloods, look at them crackheads,’” said Frederick “Scorpio” Smith, an ex-Crip. Councilman Zine still doesn’t like it: “You can go to a gang movie for a lot less money and not put yourself at risk.”
Record distance traveled in a hang glider: 437 mi.—about the distance from Boston to Wash. DC.