Great Courses Plus. Hey Geography peeps, I'm

back hope you like the Season 2 finale

of Geography Go. I mean I guess for me

personally I- I'm always thinking about

going so far abroad, that it never even

really hit me that my neighbor, Mexico,

would be just as equally fascinating, but

it was, Mexico really blew my mind away

and I really think everybody should go.

So anyway, just jumping into it, today's

video is going to be just like the last

one, except this time it's gonna be my top ten

island destinations. Number ten, Pentecost

and Tana island in Vanuatu and one of

the reasons why is, because Vanuatu in

itself is just shrouded and saturated

with cultural vibrancy and landscapes

phenomena. Tana island specifically has

Mount Yasur. This place is one of

the only places in the world we can get

incredibly close to an active volcano

with lava spewing all over the place and

Pentecost Island because the people here

from the Sa Tribe I believe? They do this

incredibly dangerous sport called "land

diving". It's almost like a primitive form

of bungee jumping, basically they tie

vines around their ankles and they jump

off a wooden structure made out of

bamboo poles that goes all the way up to

about 20 to 30 meters. This is a sight

you can't find anywhere else. Number nine,

the Kuril Islands or Kurile Islands

now you know me, I love disputed regions

and disputed areas, and this place is

definitely not short of that. Now even

though Russia and Japan did kind of come

to some kind of "agreement", these places

are still relatively "disputed" by Japan

and Russia. Nonetheless, I personally find

these islands fascinating, not only just

because of the "dispute" factor, but also

because these islands are like in the

dead center of the Ring of Fire. Many of

them still have active volcanoes, the

landscape is amazing, although

predominantly inhabited by Russians, this

is one of the only few places that

actually has native indigenous Ainu

people. They were all pretty much kicked

out of Sakhalin, but they still kept a

few of them in the Kuril Islands. Number

eight, Socotra Island. This island is found in

the Arabian Sea, belonging to Yemen. This

island has over 700 endemic species of

plants that you cannot find anywhere

else. Plants like the Dragon Blood tree,

the giant Succulent tree, and the Boswellia.

There's also that really cool

Halah cave. Just in general, the whole

island is almost like an alien

experience, almost like a different

planet. The problem is, it's kind of hard

to get here, I mean, the place is kind of

like a hot spot for like Somali pirates.

Nonetheless, if diplomatic issues subsided

and you know controversy and pirates and

all that stuff kind of stuff got brushed

off, yeah, I would love to go, I would

absolutely love to go. Number seven, now

this one's a little strange because it's

technically not kind of like an island,

but this is actually kind of more like a

"theoretical" island, because very few

people have actually kind of claimed that

they've seen it and it might not even be

very easily visible because a lot of it

might actually be underwater. The Great

Pacific Garbage Patch. Oceanographers and

scientists assume that there might

actually be a huge landmass, "landmass",

made out of discarded plastic and

garbage that was tossed to the Pacific

Ocean and the ocean currents and winds

push them all into one conglomerated

section into the Pacific Ocean. They

don't know exactly how big it is, but

some estimate that it could be as big as

700,000 square kilometers. It's also not

very easily visible because it kind of

shifts throughout the oceans and it's

floating. I don't know though, to me, it

might be kind of cool to like just sail

into the ocean and then see a huge,

massive, piece of anomaly in the distance.

I don't know why garbage is fascinating

to me, but I don't know, to me, I find that

kind of- I'm weird like that, I don't know

why I find that interesting, but I do.

Number six, Eil Malk or Merchercar

island in Palau. One reason why I want to

see this place, Jellyfish Lake. The

indigenous Golden and Moon jellyfish

that are found in this lake have very

weak sting receptors on their tentacles

and hence, you can swim amongst them

without any worry of injury. The thing is

though, you can only snorkel here, you

cannot scuba dive because the bubbles

apparently affect them when it goes up

into their bells or whatever you- I don't

know jellyfish anatomy. So yeah, that's

that. Number five, the Faroe Islands.The

Faroe Islands, you know they speak for

themselves. You know, not only do you have

these breathtaking, captivatingly,

beautiful looking islands and sharp

cliffs and jagged rocks. You have that

horn spike shaped island, you have that

lake that looks like it's about to spill

over into the ocean, you have these turf

houses in the countryside with sheep all

concealed within the foggy overcast

atmosphere of the North Atlantic. But

what I find really fascinating are the

people here, they're almost like the

little brother of Iceland. Their language

and Icelandic are the closest things to

ancient Norse that you can find.

Nonetheless, the traditions and customs

of these islands have been held on to

tightly for over a millennia. It's just-

it's really cool to see who they are and

how they live in that area. Number four

the Crozet and Kerguelen Islands. Now

you guys know I have an affinity for the

cold inhospitable Arctic or Antarctic

regions of the planet. This place fits

right into that

category. Now Kerguelen Island is kind of

strange because it is kind of classified

as like a sub Antarctic region, but it's

still kind of lush and flora. It's also famous

for the Kerguelen cabbages which grow

here you can't really find them in

almost anywhere else on the planet.

Penguins visit regularly in the droves.

If you can make it up to the Cook Ice Cap,

the view would just be amazing and

breathtaking. I would love to see that, to

me, that is enticing. Number three, little

Diomede Island. Ah we're back in my own

country, alright, uh, well hey, Alaska let's

go. For those of you that don't know, will Diomede

Island sits right across the

International Date Line from big Diomede

Island. So even though the islands are

literally only like two miles apart, they

are an entire day apart from each other.

It is perpetually tomorrow two miles

away on big Diomede Island. There are

only about 150 people that live on

little Diomede Island and they're mostly

of the native Inuit people and it's

really interesting because there's

almost like no room for people to live

on that island, if you look at it, like

the cliffs are just so steep and high

and there's only like a very narrow

small little valley inlet before you hit

the coast. But these people live there

and they don't mind it. I would love to

talk to those people, I would love to

meet them. I think the people on little

Diomede Island [would] probably be some of the

most interesting people I'd ever meet.

Little Diomede Island, I'm coming for you.

Speaking of violence with interesting

people, number two, La Gomera island. Now

this island is the second smallest of

the Spanish Canary Islands, however

there's a cool little secret hidden

amongst the people in this place. Most of

the residents on this island are fluent

in Silbo Gomero. This is almost like

a special coded language that they speak,

except they don't really speak it, they

whistle it. This is what it looks like,

(whistling)

they can literally have full-on conversations just through whistling

with each other. Apparently it started a

long time ago when they had to find a

way to communicate across the wide

ravines on the island and they couldn't

really yell, so they decided 'hey let's

whistle that's more sharp and that's

more easily audible', and through that, they

somehow developed like a code of tones

and whistles that were able to express

the words that they wanted to say. Other

than I think a small town in Turkey, I

think they are like the only people on

the planet that have a "whistling"

language. I would love to see that. And

finally that brings us to island number

one, but before we do here are some

honorable mentions. The floating islands

in Lake Titicaca in Peru. Svalbard, Norway.

Howland and Baker Island. Caroline Island

in Kiribati. Sable Island in Canada

that is overrun with horses. Ōkunoshima

Island in Japan that had overrun with

rabbits. The urban, abandoned, Hashima

Island in Japan. Saint Martin, the only

place where France touches the

Netherlands, "technically" I mean they

consider themselves a different country.

But Niihau, Hawaii, the only island in the

Hawaiian Islands that is solely

inhabited by Native Hawaiian people and

their first mother language is Hawaiian.

Dominica because just watched the

episode. Seychelles. Christmas Island with

their crab invasions. Tristan da Cunha

with their remoteness. Bouvet island

which is even more remoteness.

Kaffeklubben, the most northern land mass on

the planet. Iriomote-jima and Ishigaki-jima

because (laughing). So that brings us to number

one, Pancake Island! Okay so that isn't

actually the name of the island, it's

just the name it I gave it. But if you

watch the Canada episode, I'm talking

about the island, in a lake, on an island,

in a lake, on an island. You have to go

way up north to get here. I'm pretty sure

some people may have already made it to

this island, however to the best of my

knowledge, nobody has really extensively

documented it yet. So why not? I kind of

want to go there and plant my flag and

say, "I made it to Pancake Island!" I

actually did the research, like you would

have to fly to Victoria Island and then

you'd have to like hire a snowmobile guy

to take you as far as you possibly can.

Then if the water is frozen, you might be

able to walk across it, but if not, you

might have to bring portable canoe. And

if the water isn't frozen, again, you

would have to hike all the way through

the next Island, and then bring your

canoe with you, and then go across next

water. It's a long process, so uh, Canadian

National Tourism Board, if you'd like to

sponsor me kind of like what Greenland

just did a few weeks ago, yeah, I'm

totally down, I would love to go to