In nearly four decades of incessant globe-trotting, Tony Wheeler, the co-founder of Lonely Planet, has seen nearly all the planet's sensationally wonderful places. He's also seen the great places, the pretty good places, the so-so places and the not-too-bad places. There wasn't much left to do but to start collecting passport stamps from the really bad places.Posted by James Zellmer at June 24, 2007 9:37 AM | Subscribe to this site via RSS:The result is one of the most oddly compelling travel books in recent years, "Bad Lands: A Tourist on the Axis of Evil -- With Additional Excursions to Places That Are Slightly Misguided, Mildly Malevolent, Seriously Off-Course, Extraordinarily Reclusive and Much Misunderstood."
Wheeler pulled off the Axis of Evil hat trick: Iraq, Iran and North Korea. Then he moved on to Afghanistan, Burma/Myanmar, Saudi Arabia, Cuba and George W. Bush's new favorite country, Albania, for a nostalgic look at the bad old days under Enver Hoxha.
The obvious question is, uh, why? I asked Wheeler this over lunch in San Francisco recently.
