Hello and welcome to today's independent travel podcast with me Simon Calder. It's Monday the 16th of

September. Yes, more than halfway through the ninth month of the year. The nights are really drawing in

and I guess most of us are just trying to plan another adventure. Well, fortunately, I've got just the

person who can help with that. She is Hazel McGuire, the general manager for

intrepid travel. The reason I want to talk to her right now is because her company has come out

with a not hot list, which is an interesting concept because pretty much everyone else comes

out with hot lists. So what's that about then, Hazel?

We always like to do something a little bit different. The Not Hot List is the idea of gathering

together a collection of destinations around the world which are perhaps underrepresented by

tourism and underappreciated perhaps by visitors because they don't either know they exist

or they've never really looked into it. So it's about looking for those lesser known off the beaten track and places

that really would welcome that tourism as well. So looking at those tourism numbers as well.

Is this something you put in place because of the growing concern about over tourism in some

particular hotspots? Yes, over tourism is certainly particular hot spots?

Yes, overtourism is certainly a huge driver of looking at it this way.

The Not Hot List has existed since 2018,

but I think if we look at this year, we see overtourism dominating headlines really throughout the summer and particularly very close to home for us here, so Barcelona, New Yorka, other places.

And where the Not Hot List is really seeking to say, so Barcelona, New Yorka, other places, and where the not hot list is really

seeking to say, how can we disperse those tourism dollars a little bit, but also how can we

encourage people to just look beyond those hot spots and beyond those sort of, I guess,

the ones that quite often top those must-do lists as well.

It certainly is the sort of list that I've not really seen before,

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