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Wikivoyage:Destination of the month candidates

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Here we determine which articles are featured on the Main Page as Destination of the month (DotM), Off the Beaten Path (OtBP) and Featured travel topics (FTT).

Nominate

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You can nominate any article you would like to see featured. Any destination, region, itinerary or event that passes the "What is an article?" test is eligible for nomination.

However, before nominating, please check that the article follows these basic guidelines:

  • The nominated article should have an article status of guide or star. This includes having at least one good picture, and listings/headers/etc. that match our manual of style.
  • The nominated article must not have been featured since Wikivoyage became a WMF project in 2013.
  • If the article has been nominated previously but failed, any objections should be addressed before nominating it again.
    • Check the slush pile.
    • If you think a once-slushed destination is now ready to go, list it as new, but with a pointer to the slush pile entry.
    • The article should preferably be nominated 3 to 12 months before the intended feature date; ready to feature as is, or with edits that can be done well before featuring.

Well-known and/or popular destinations should be nominated as Destination of the Month, while more obscure destinations should be nominated for Off the Beaten Path. Featured Travel Topic includes travel topics, phrasebooks, itineraries, and other articles not part of the geographic hierarchy, as well as airports (as they are not usually destinations in their own right). Where applicable, you should propose a good time to visit the destination as a month to be featured.

The basic format of a nomination is as follows:

{{FeatureNom
| place=Destination
| blurb='''[[Destination]]''' is a place of contrasts, and as such it...
| status=Guide
| time=March-June
| nominatedBy=~~~~
| comment=Great article and it's just luvvly-jubbly in the springtime.
| DotMImage=[[File:Destinationimage.jpg|thumb|300px]]
}}

Add a nomination to the end of the appropriate section.

Discuss

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You can comment on any nomination based on timeliness and adherence to the criteria above, just add a bullet point (*) and your signed opinion.

===[[Destination]]===
Great article and it's just luvvly-jubbly in the springtime. TravelNut 25:25, 31 Feb 2525 (UTC)
* Looks nice, but shouldn't the Do section contain more than just quilting contests? ~~~~

Please note that the following are not considered valid reasons to oppose a nomination:

  • "I don't like it." All objections have to be based on the guidelines above: poor formatting, missing information, etc. Personal opinions, dislikes, etc. do not count.
  • "Wrong time of year." Articles are supported or opposed based on their content. Timing can be worked out later.
  • "Wrong type of place." Articles are supported or opposed based on their content. Whether it's DotM or OtBP can be worked out later.

Select

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If an article gets several comments in favor and none against for a week or so, it's eligible to be placed in an appropriate time-slot in the Upcoming queue. If the objections are relatively minor and are being worked on, add them to the Upcoming queue tentatively (add a question mark "?" after the article). Feel free to move the queue around or swap articles if it makes sense. If a nomination clearly does not make the grade and if the objections are not easily fixable, they go into the Slush pile.

Once a nomination has been scheduled, an appropriate banner image and text blurb must be selected. Go to Wikivoyage:Destination of the month candidates/Banners to start that discussion.

Archive

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Discussions for previously selected destinations are kept in the Archive.

Upcoming

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Schedule

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The following queue should contain about the next few months' worth of upcoming destinations. Note that new DotMs are rotated in on the 1st of each month, OtBPs on the 11th and travel topics on the 21st.

Month DotM OtBP FTT
December 2024 Manama – pending stronger consensus to support Yarrangobilly Caves – pending stronger consensus to support Churches in Antarctica – pending stronger consensus to support
January 2025 Medan El Hierro – pending fixes and stronger consensus to support Diving the Cape Peninsula and False Bay/MV Aster
February 2025 Recife – pending fixes and stronger consensus to support Tezpur – pending fixes and stronger consensus to support Serbian phrasebook – pending fixes and stronger consensus to support
March 2025 El Gouna – pending stronger consensus to support Sekigahara – pending fixes Jewish Stockholm tour – pending stronger consensus to support
April 2025 Wilmington (North Carolina) – pending fixes and stronger consensus to support Khujand – pending fixes? Vancouver International Airport – pending fixes and stronger consensus to support
May 2025 Kraków – pending stronger consensus to support New England National Park – pending stronger consensus to support E69

Try to avoid two overlapping or back-to-back features from the same country, as well as long streaks of features from the same continent. It is customary to wait 24 months between articles from the same or nearby cities.

The schedule is not cast in stone. However, any change made to the schedule should have a compelling reason behind it, and should be effected as far in advance as possible of the article's scheduled term on the Main Page. In particular, unless absolutely necessary, we discourage nominee articles from being slushed or rescheduled after banners have been made for them, which usually happens 2–3 months before being featured.

Whenever an article becomes a current feature, it should be removed from the list, the discussion archived, and (when changing out Featured Travel Topics) a new month added to the end of the queue.

Next changes

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Decisions regarding which images to use as the banners are made at Wikivoyage:Destination of the month candidates/Banners.

The section below provides an opportunity to see what the upcoming featured articles will look like on the Main Page using the banners that are currently most popular on the above page.

Updating

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On the date of the scheduled change, the DotM, OtBP, or FTT should be changed as close to midnight UTC as possible. This can only be done by administrators. When the featured page is changed, please follow the following procedures to do so and archive content to the appropriate pages. At each stage, please double-check that you are correctly moving content. Several steps involves copy pasting of the file names of the Main Page banners – former, current, and next – so it can be useful to open those in tabs first.

  1. Update the featured articles on the main page by replacing the current 'banner' template section with those of the appropriate banner for the new DotM/OtBP/FTT found in the Next change section above.
  2. Update the Photo credits page with the banner's original image, title and attribution.
  3. Add the former featured article to the appropriate archive page: Previous Destinations of the month, Previously Off the beaten path, or Previous Featured travel topics.
  4. For the former featured article, add the appropriate parameter to the pagebanner template (directly after the image filename) to label the page as having been featured previously.
    • For former DotMs, add: |dotm=yes
    • For former OtBPs, add: |otbp=yes
    • For former FTTs, add: |ftt=yes
  5. Remove Template:Featurenomination from newly featured article.
  6. Archive the newly featured article's nomination. Simply cut-and-paste the nomination section of the newly featured article from this page to Wikivoyage:Destination of the month candidates/Archive.
  7. Update the Next change section above by adding the banner from the discussion page. View the table in the Schedule section above to determine what next month's change will be, then update the image and blurb in the "Next change" section with that found in the upcoming featured article's nomination.
  8. In the schedule, use <s> and </s> to strikethrough the newly featured article. Remove the row from the table if the newly featured article is the FTT.
  9. Archive the newly featured article's banner by cutting-and-pasting all banner suggestions and the associated discussion into Wikivoyage:Destination of the month candidates/Banners/Archive.

Nominations for Destination of the Month

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Place: Medan
Blurb: A melting pot of cultures, Indonesia's fourth city is off the tourist radar for foreigners, but popular among Indonesians especially for its food culture. (should not exceed ~145 characters)
Article status: Guide (must be guide or above).
Time to feature: Jan-Apr is the driest time of the year
Nominated by: Ypsilon (talk) 16:58, 1 May 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Comment: We've featured Indonesian destinations quite a few times, but now when I checked all of them are from Java, Bali or Nusa Tenggara. This one would be the first from the bigger islands further north. Could use an update (ie. listings checked up using Google Maps) before it's featured. And it needs pictures in other sections than See!
Nomination
Support as User:M.akbar.raf apparently went through the article in August. Ypsilon (talk) 19:28, 30 November 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Place: Recife
Blurb: There are many sides to Recife, the city is steeped in colonial history but famed for its urban beaches too. (should not exceed ~145 characters)
Article status: Guide (must be guide or above).
Time to feature: Oct-Feb (Carnival in late February!)
Nominated by: Ypsilon (talk) 16:58, 1 May 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Comment: Updated in late 2020/early 2021, nominated for a slot in early 2022. I mentioned then that the listings needed to be checked for up to datedness, but otherwise the article was in a quite good shape. Now almost half a year before the article was to be run, it was slushed because it hadn't been updated (also because there was a bad COVID situation in Brazil, nevertheless I can't remember this would have been a problem for any other article that was featured during the pandemic). So here it is again. Some edits have been made to the article by others in the meantime, to a large extent it's the same article. As I envision to see this on the main page perhaps for February's slot, it's better to make the up to date check later.
Nomination

Place: El Gouna
Blurb: This Red Sea resort has some activity for everyone, in an environment that's not just glass, steel and tourists on the coast. (should not exceed ~145 characters)
Article status: Guide (must be guide or above).
Time to feature: "Autumn and spring are the best times to visit", though I wouldn't run a place next to the Sahara desert too close to summer... March 2025?
Nominated by: Ypsilon (talk) 18:59, 24 July 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Comment: How about an article about a beach resort town built from scratch, I don't remember us featuring any destination like that before? I translated the Star status article from German WV (which has a strong coverage of Egypt) last year, checking listings in Google Maps. Now when looking at the article, it has quite a lot of pictures, so maybe some of them should be deleted (the original article has even more of them), but otherwise I think the article looks OK.
Nomination

Place: Wilmington (North Carolina)
Blurb: Gardens and plantations meet antebellum architecture and beaches of the Atlantic in the city sometimes nicknamed Wilmywood (should not exceed ~145 characters)
Article status: Guide (must be guide or above).
Time to feature: April 2025? - warm weather but not hurricane season yet, and in April there's an Azalea Festival too
Nominated by: Ypsilon (talk) 18:59, 24 July 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Comment: This is one of those destinations that could work both as a DotM and OtBP, I'm putting it in the former because we already have OtBP candidates for the spring months. The article does have content in all sections, but a lot of listings need coordinates and when googling and adding them we will also find which places that have closed down. In other words, Wilmington needs the standard update a month or two before the article goes on the Main Page.
Nomination

Place: Kraków
Blurb: With over a thousand years of history and a uniquely well-preserved Old City, Kraków is Poland's top tourist draw for a reason. (should not exceed ~145 characters)
Article status: Guide (must be guide or above).
Time to feature: Any time outside midwinter
Nominated by: Jpatokal (talk) 06:23, 29 September 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Comment: I'm genuinely surprised this very detailed guide has never been a DotM. Prices need updating (inflation has been on a roll lately) and the POIs could use more coordinates, but there's plenty of content in here.
Nomination
  • Very close - It was slushed back in 2012, then apparently because the district articles were in a poor state. Now they do have content and usable status, though we should definitely update the listings there. The main article is quite OK, but some sections with bullet points could be converted to normal text, and there is probably a thing or two to update here also. Finally, the last third of the article could use a photo or two. --Ypsilon (talk) 18:22, 7 October 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Place: Snowdonia National Park
Blurb: The stunning landscapes of Snowdon and surroundings can be explored both on foot and by several railways. (should not exceed ~145 characters)
Article status: Guide (must be guide or above).
Time to feature: May-Sep
Nominated by: Ypsilon (talk) 19:51, 7 October 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Comment: European national parks aren't on the Main Page too often, so how about this Welsh one which looks really beautiful on the photos? We need to check that all the listings are still in operation, and some listings need a description. There are not many Eat, Drink and Sleep listings, but I guess it's because there are individual articles for towns in and around the park (listed in Sleep) where those can be found.
Nomination

Place: Gothenburg
Blurb: Scandinavia's most populous non-capital city springs into life during the summer months. (should not exceed ~145 characters)
Article status: Guide (must be guide or above).
Time to feature: May-Sep
Nominated by: Ypsilon (talk) 19:51, 7 October 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Comment: I've been thinking about nominating this article for quite a while now. Some listings look rather bare-bones and a month or two before the article is featured we should check that all the listings are still in business. And my pet peeve :) – the latter half of the article could use some more photos.
Nomination

Place: Cuzco
Blurb: Cuzco is not only a place to immense yourself in Inca history and culture, but also the gateway to the Sacred Valley. (should not exceed ~145 characters)
Article status: Guide (must be guide or above).
Time to feature: Apr-Oct is the dry season, according to the climate section
Nominated by: Ypsilon (talk) 16:52, 28 November 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Comment: One of those once in a lifetime travel destinations for many voyagers. Per se the article has a lot of content, but as many coordinates are missing, probably those listings have been added a long time ago so everything needs to be run through Google a while before the article is featured. Of course if e.g. a restaurant was added say 15 years ago and it's still in business, it's usually a good indication that customers are happy with the place and it's worth going to.
Nomination

Nominations for Off the Beaten Path

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Place: New England National Park
Blurb: Visit one of the world's best preserved Gondwana Rainforests in New South Wales with many of New England National Park's hiking trails showcasing exactly that. (should not exceed ~145 characters)
Article status: Guide (must be guide or above).
Time to feature: Southern winter (ideally), though spring and autumn also work.
Nominated by: SHB2000 (talk | contribs | meta) 06:02, 29 March 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Comment: We have 25 Australian guide park articles – let's feature another one of them.
Nomination

Place: Sekigahara
Blurb: This quaint mountain town and battlefield, where Tokugawa won control of Japan, gives visitors firsthand insight into feudal Japanese warfare. (should not exceed ~145 characters)
Article status: Guide (must be guide or above).
Time to feature: March-May; October
Nominated by: Tuyuhun (talk) 11:34, 2 May 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Comment: This town would be perfect for OTBP, given its importance in Japanese history and its well-developed tourist services. It is a small town with very few dining options and lodging (which might be an issue but might not depending on consensus), but it is close to larger Japanese cities like Maibara and Nagoya and would be a perfect day trip from Kyoto et al., especially since it is on a major train line. It is especially beautiful in the spring when the plum and cherry blossoms bloom, but the Battle of Sekigahara was in October of 1600, so it would also work for an October listing.
Nomination
  • Support Can't see anything that would prevent this from being an OtBP. --SHB2000 (talk | contribs | meta) 12:07, 2 May 2024 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support Article looks good & the site is important. Pashley (talk) 15:00, 2 May 2024 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support The article is good. Having visited once, I can attest that the historical sites are really not geared for English-speaking visitors, but the article doesn't pretend otherwise and it's fine for a mildly interesting day trip. Jpatokal (talk) 06:01, 3 May 2024 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support. Well, if there are few places to eat and drink and sleep, we can't list any more than there actually is :). I think we should run the Sekigahara in October for the re-enactment of the battle as we will probably already have one Japanese feature sometime next spring (Public baths in Japan as FTT). --Ypsilon (talk) 08:50, 10 May 2024 (UTC)[reply]
  • Not Yet With zero "Eat" or "Buy" listings, this article has not earned guide status. We should not be saying things like "some decent restaurants and cafes opened both in the battlefield and around the station". Instead, those restaurants and cafes should be given listings. Sekigahara's website shows that the city has numerous restaurants. Similarly "souvenir shops around town" should be given listings. Other encampments should also be given listings. They will not overwhelm the article and they provide deeper understanding of the battle, especially in an article that says you won't understand if you don't speak Japanese. The article also doesn't list much outside of the battlefield. No War Land? No cave? No mention of the Nakasendo post town (Sekigahara-juku)? How about the opportunity to don samurai outfits? I have been to Sekigahara numerous times. It wasn't really on my radar to edit, but maybe I can try adding things here and there to get it up to standard. ChubbyWimbus (talk) 14:59, 30 June 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Better to run it in the spring, then, if there's content that needs to be added to the article. --Ypsilon (talk) 07:51, 11 August 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Place: Khujand
Blurb: Founded by Alexander the Great and beloved by Lenin, Tajikistan's second city is more than just a base for hiking into the nearby Fann Mountains. (should not exceed ~145 characters)
Article status: Guide (must be guide or above).
Time to feature: Any time
Nominated by: Tuyuhun (talk) 17:18, 13 May 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Comment: We've done one (1) Central Asian destination in all of DotM history (Karakol). It's high time we feature something else from the region. While I know that even major CA cities like Almaty might count as OtBP, I nominated Khujand because it's a hidden gem of the region and many mountaineering tourists use it as a base for treks into the Fann mountains when they visit Tajikistan. Many 'multi-Stan' tours now go through Khujand as well, since the Pamir Hwy is essentially a no-go with the Kyrgyzstan-Tajikistan border being closed. It can be run at any month of the year since the climate is mild enough in the winter and not boiling hot in the summer. Summer or Fall would fit best with the mountaineering schedule.
Nomination
  • Comment - I'd imagine a city of almost 200,000 inhabitants would have a few more places to Drink and Sleep worth listing? --Ypsilon (talk) 19:21, 9 July 2024 (UTC)[reply]
  • Comment: I was going to say something similar to Ypsi – surely a city of that size has more establishments than what's on the page as of typing this? --SHB2000 (t | c | m) 23:05, 9 July 2024 (UTC)[reply]
    I have been living in Khujand since Aug 2023, and there is one bar and only three reputable hotels, which are all listed. There do exist a few other businesses that brand themselves as being "hotels", but I have not been able to verify their quality or any other important information about them. There is one bar in town, and even then it's more for hookah than for alcohol. Tuyuhun (talk) 01:15, 21 July 2024 (UTC)[reply]
    I see, in that case I support. --SHB2000 (t | c | m) 01:55, 21 July 2024 (UTC)[reply]
    I went and added the few other hotels that I know of that I could find information for online. I also broke it down into "Budget and Mid-range" and "Splurge" subsections. Tuyuhun (talk) 02:00, 21 July 2024 (UTC)[reply]
    One thing, though: given this is TJ's second-largest city, wouldn't this be better suited as a DotM? --SHB2000 (t | c | m) 23:38, 23 July 2024 (UTC)[reply]
    I think it could be either - Central Asia as a whole is very much a "forgotten" part of the world (at least by Anglophone travelers) so imo it would probably be at about the same level of notoriety as a place like Zinder or Taos - known to a decent number of travelers, but nowhere near the numbers that somewhere like Recife or Harbin are known. But if the consensus is that it's better as a DotM, then that works. Tuyuhun (talk) 04:47, 26 July 2024 (UTC)[reply]
    My thing by doing so is we're being extremely ethnocentric by only catering for Anglophone countries (enwikivoyage has evolved into catering for pretty much everyone given how lackluster most other voy projects are barring de and itwikivoyage). But I also wouldn't object it being an OtBP if that's what consensus goes with. SHB2000 (t | c | m) 10:24, 26 July 2024 (UTC)[reply]
    Are the sights crowded with tourists? If so, DotM would suit better. But if there aren't many tourists, even if the city is comparably well-known, then OtBP feels alright. –LPfi (talk) 13:22, 26 July 2024 (UTC)[reply]
    Maybe, but it feels incredibly wrong to feature Arches National Park, Glacier National Park (Montana), and Milford Sound as DotMs but not this. --SHB2000 (t | c | m) 13:57, 26 July 2024 (UTC)[reply]
    Having lived there, I can say with relative certainty that it is NOT a hyper-touristy destination. We didn't start to get tourists until the end of spring (partly because only a stupid masochistic person goes hiking in Tajikistan's mountains in the winter and partly because that's when the Central Asian/Silk Road package tours start running). All of the national parks SHB2000 listed get more tourists and have more name recognition than Khujand. My vote is for OtBP. Tuyuhun (talk) 20:25, 26 July 2024 (UTC)[reply]
    We also need to update the banner since there has been an uptick in construction on the north side of the river; I tried earlier and it didn't work. Tuyuhun (talk) 20:27, 26 July 2024 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support. Pashley (talk) 21:59, 23 July 2024 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support again, if there isn't any more places to list, then the article would be complete... --Ypsilon (talk) 20:08, 20 September 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Place: El Hierro
Blurb: The remotest of the Canary Islands is a place to explore forests and volcanic formations and enjoy the relaxed island lifestyle (should not exceed ~145 characters)
Article status: Guide (must be guide or above).
Time to feature: Dec-Apr is probably most popular, though the weather is OK around the year
Nominated by: Ypsilon (talk) 19:21, 9 July 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Comment: Given the tremendous popularity of the Canary Islands as a place to escape the winter for Europeans, it's surprising how we've never had any feature from here. Well, maybe it's suitable that the first feature is the least visited island, as OtBP. The article is mostly a translation from the article at de-WV, where many listings lacked descriptions. I've expanded most of them based on what I've found online, though there are still some listings to expand. Aiming for January's or February's OtBP slot.
Nomination

Place: Tezpur
Blurb: The venue for a love story involving the grandson of Lord Krishna, don't be surprised to find several shrines and temples in this city on the Brahmaputra. (should not exceed ~145 characters)
Article status: Guide (must be guide or above).
Time to feature: Nov-Mar
Nominated by: Ypsilon (talk) 19:38, 20 August 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Comment: We need something for February's OtBP slot, and there's been a while since we featured an Indian article. The article looks good, but it was slushed a little over a year ago because of the Drink section. However, as I commented on Talk:Tezpur (the last thread), it's really hard to find drinking establishments in Tezpur, especially ones serving alcohol, and this also goes for the menus of restaurants. So possibly there really isn't anything to add to the Drink section. If this is the case I think the article is good to go after a removal of closed places.
Nomination

Place: Vaals
Blurb: At the foot of Netherlands' highest point, Vaals is a great example of a Dutch small town, with a weekly market and all! (should not exceed ~145 characters)
Article status: Guide (must be guide or above).
Time to feature: May-Sep
Nominated by: Ypsilon (talk) 19:51, 7 October 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Comment: One of the guide articles of small Dutch towns that we haven't featured yet. Many listings need coordinates, and at that we'd also see if they're still in business. Otherwise I think it's in a good shape. Yeah, and some of the photos could be changed to ones with blue sky, to make the article look happier...
Nomination
  • Almost per comment. --Ypsilon (talk) 19:51, 7 October 2024 (UTC)[reply]
  • Needs a little bit of work – listings lack coordinates and lastedit fields, but I'll try work on this over the coming days. --SHB2000 (t | c | m) 22:30, 8 December 2024 (UTC)[reply]
  • Close. Aside from what's already been said, I'm mostly just wondering why Lemiers and Holset haven't been merged into this article yet? Generally speaking, the Netherlands is covered with municipalities as the bottom regions, with an occasional exception for large towns and historical cities. Neither of these towns really merits their own article on that basis and should probably be merged into the municipality they're a part of: Vaals. ― Wauteurz (talk) 12:45, 9 December 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Place: Waterville, Maine
Blurb: This little town in the northeastern US packs a college with Maine's largest art museum and a renowned film festival in the summer. (should not exceed ~145 characters)
Article status: Guide (must be guide or above).
Time to feature: Jun-Sep
Nominated by: Ypsilon (talk) 19:54, 15 November 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Comment: Something we haven't had before: a destination feature from New England outside Massachusetts. It's at guide status but does need work; as usual listings need to be updated including deleting closed businesses and adding descriptions and coordinates. And it needs photos and more places to eat and drink.
Nomination
  • Needs some work per comment. Ypsilon (talk) 19:54, 15 November 2024 (UTC)[reply]
  • The most glaring issue is the blank "Understand" section. Also, if it's true as stated in the lede that "Franco-American culture is evident here," is much French spoken, and should that be stated in "Understand" or perhaps a separate optional "Talk" section? In "Get around," Enterprise is the only car rental agency listed. I can't believe that's the only option in town, and do we need to mention any? I also note the absence of a climate chart or description. So yeah, a lot of work is needed, and the article seems to be a questionable Guide at this point. Ikan Kekek (talk) 21:05, 15 November 2024 (UTC)[reply]
  • Needs work per above. --SHB2000 (t | c | m) 22:28, 8 December 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Place: Paldiski
Blurb: In this Baltic Sea port you can dive into the remains of the former Soviet Union. (should not exceed ~145 characters)
Article status: Guide (must be guide or above).
Time to feature: May-Sep
Nominated by: Ypsilon (talk) 19:54, 15 November 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Comment: Our first feature from the Baltic States in another category than DotM. The article is a translation of a ru-WV Star article by me. The article can possibly be expanded a little, but fact remains that you won't find too many places to eat and drink here (or at least was the case back in 2019 when I visited).
Nomination

Place: North Central New Mexico
Blurb: The hidden gem of the American Southwest with thriving art communities, high-elevation resort towns, and some of the most scenic drives anywhere on earth. (should not exceed ~145 characters)
Article status: Guide (must be guide or above).
Time to feature: Any; winter for skiing/snowboarding, summer for outdoor activities.
Nominated by: Tuyuhun (talk) 06:27, 6 December 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Comment: I don't know if this Region article would work better in OtBP or even DotM (Santa Fe and Taos would both qualify for the latter), but it reads more like an itinerary than a true "destination" article. The article is complete; most of the associated destination links are at Guide status and the ones that aren't are at Usable and are mostly small towns. We can work on some of the Usable articles to get them up to Guide status before we run this. Like mentioned above, this article can also work as OtBP or DotM if that's what the consensus has (I don't know how we usually treat Region-level articles for this). The one comment I have about the page is that we could clean up the "Cities" tab to fit the 7±2 rule.
Nomination
  • Comment - Thanks for the nomination! I see what you mean about aspects of this article being like an itinerary, but as it's definitely a geographical region it can't be an FTT. I've moved it up to here for now, but if it would fit better in DOTM, that's fine with me.--ThunderingTyphoons! (talk) 22:23, 8 December 2024 (UTC)[reply]
  • Sorry to crash this, but it's ineligible as it was already featured before (OtBP, December 2016). For future reference, look at the upper right corner of the banner: a green tick mark means it's been featured as DotM previously, a blue "turn right" traffic sign OtBP and an orange pen FTT. However we do have a lot of unfeatured articles with guide status from the southwestern U.S. so feel free to nominate one of those. --Ypsilon (talk) 17:03, 9 December 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Also the 7+-2 rule doesn't apply to the lowest level of region articles, the level right above the cities, towns and parks, to make sure that these are listed in at least one region. --Ypsilon (talk) 17:07, 9 December 2024 (UTC)[reply]
[edit]

Place: Churches in Antarctica
Blurb: While you won't be able to visit all Antarctic churches at once, the few churches on the frozen continent highlight how Christianity has truly reached every corner of the globe. (should not exceed ~145 characters)
Article status: Guide (must be guide or above).
Time to feature: sometime during the summer, between October and February.
Nominated by: SHB2000 (talk | contribs | meta) 10:43, 2 January 2023 (UTC)[reply]
Comment: Although I said I'll wait a bit before nominating this, I'll be out next week and there's no harm in nominating this early.

As to the article itself, I realise this is a bit of a niche topic and no traveller visits Antarctica for its churches (unless they're a part of a maintenance crew or something alike) and also somewhat overgeneralised, Wikivoyage attracts many armchair travellers and thanks to the excellent work of Grahamsands, this is a good armchair article, in my opinion.
Nomination
Comment: We have plenty of travel topics nominated, and the travel topics have potential for new articles, with itineraries, and thematic articles such as these. Shall we allow geographic travel topics to run as DoTM and OtBP? /Yvwv (talk) 14:38, 2 January 2023 (UTC)[reply]
If the alternative is to run a destination article that hasn't been updated since before the pandemic, I think such flexibility is preferable. Otherwise, probably not. Ikan Kekek (talk) 02:47, 20 January 2023 (UTC)[reply]
I'd be open to featuring this in Off the beaten path, because it doesn't get much more OtBP than this. Jpatokal (talk) 02:55, 20 January 2023 (UTC)[reply]

Place: Diving the Cape Peninsula and False Bay/MV Aster
Blurb: The M.V. Aster was scuttled in 1997 the Hout Bay of the Cape Peninsula near Cape Town, as a diver-friendly artificial reef. (should not exceed ~145 characters)
Article status: Star (must be guide or above).
Time to feature: Southern summer: Late 2024 or early 2025
Nominated by: Yvwv (talk) 12:01, 4 April 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Comment: We have been featuring the best of Diving the Cape Peninsula and False Bay/Dive sites articles; the last one in early 2022, which is now past the recommended 24 month cooldown between neighboring destinations. These articles alleviate the shortage of features from Africa, without compromising on quality.
Nomination

Place: Public baths in Japan
Blurb: Bathing Japanese style is a pleasure, and a visit to a Japanese hot spring should be on the agenda of every visitor. (should not exceed ~145 characters)
Article status: Guide (must be guide or above).
Time to feature: Any time of year, except maybe midsummer
Nominated by: Jpatokal (talk) 22:28, 4 April 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Comment: Needs a bit of cleanup but contentwise this is great. Not entirely convinced that "Toilets" belongs in here though.
Nomination

Place: Serbian phrasebook
Blurb: Written in two scripts, Serbian is closely related to other languages in the former Yugoslavia. As such, this phrasebook can be helpful throughout much of the Western Balkans. (should not exceed ~145 characters)
Article status: Guide (must be guide or above).
Time to feature: Any
Nominated by: Ypsilon (talk) 20:22, 9 August 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Comment: We've featured something from most European countries, but the countries that have never been on the Main Page are almost all in the Balkans. So let's add a few countries more with this phrasebook. All of the words and sentences have been translated, but as usual I plan to add quite a lot of pictures (as usual with our featured phrasebooks) to make the article livelier.
Nomination
Comment: When it comes to season, we have some tradition to feature phrasebooks during the beginning of the year. This is appropriate, as climate in Serbia is good at spring and autumn. Not sure about public events, though. /Yvwv (talk) 23:12, 20 August 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Well, we don't need events for all articles, even if they are nice to have every now and then. --Ypsilon (talk) 16:30, 21 August 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Place: Vancouver International Airport
Blurb: Canada's main airport on the Pacific is well connected to East Asia. (should not exceed ~145 characters)
Article status: Guide (must be guide or above).
Time to feature: Any; again as the airports that get their own articles are places where many people change planes and also for departures from the destination, the local weather really doesn't need to be considered unlike for our DotM and OtBP features...
Nominated by: Ypsilon (talk) 20:22, 9 August 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Comment: Believe it or not, it was before the pandemic we last featured an airport guide from outside Asia. Here's a good one that I had my eyes on for quite a while. A shoutout to User:Othello95 for starting up and writing much of the article!
Nomination

Place: San Diego International Airport
Blurb: The main airport to America's finest city is the busiest single runway airport in the world, (should not exceed ~145 characters)
Article status: Guide (must be guide or above).
Time to feature: Year round, not only because there are people who change planes in the San Diego International Airport, but also because San Diego itself is a good place to visit any time of the year.
Nominated by: Someonehere12345 (talk) 04:28, 20 August 2024 (UTC)Someonehere12345[reply]
Comment: Last time an article from an airport in the United States was featured travel topic, it was November 2019 Atlanta. (please note I do not have a banner in mind, but if anyone does then feel free to bring it up in the destination of the month candidates/banners page.
Nomination

Place: Jewish Stockholm tour
Blurb: One of few European capitals to evade the Holocaust has a lively Jewish community, celebrating 250 years as a legal faith and 25 years as a recognized minority. (should not exceed ~145 characters)
Article status: Guide (must be guide or above).
Time to feature: 2025 is the 250th anniversary of legalization of Judaism, the 80th anniversary of the end of WWII, and the 25th anniversary of the recognition of Jews as a national minority. It will be 2 years since the conceptually similar Swedish Empire featured. While weather is best at summer, this tour could be appropriate at Pesach or Rosh Hashana.
Nominated by: Yvwv (talk) 12:12, 23 September 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Comment: As the Jewish community in Stockholm has always been rather small, the scope of this article is limited, making it unclear how to meet the requirements for status. Native English proofreading and suggested additions would be appreciated. The security situation at Jewish sites has been complex; hopefully it will not get even worse.
Nomination
  • Support - Interesting and somewhat unexpected topic; I would never have guessed there'd be so much of Jewish heritage in Stockholm to create a whole article. For the scheduling, I remember saying earlier that I planned to nominate Gothenburg for some summer month next summer, meaning it'd be better to run this during either of the holidays you mentioned - why not right away at the Pesach (March's FTT slot - if readers are worried about the weather they can postpone their visit a couple of months)? --Ypsilon (talk) 20:41, 27 September 2024 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support per above. --SHB2000 (t | c | m) 22:07, 27 September 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Comment: Some Jewish sites (in particular the cemeteries) are too far from the main route to serve as useful waypoints, though still mentioned in the article. Several of the waypoints (statues of kings etc) don't have a direct connection to Swedish Jews, but instead serve as proxies for important events in Jewish history. As mentioned, Swedish Empire (with emphasis on Stockholm) featured May-June 2023, giving 22 months cooldown before May-April 2025 (24 months have been recommended), and we would wait until 2027 to feature another Stockholm-based article (Södermalm heights tour, Stockholm environmentalist tour or Haunted Stockholm tour might be considered). /Yvwv (talk) 19:56, 2 October 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Sorry, but I don't see how the Swedish Empire article would be focused on Stockholm. Just six out of 35 listings are from there and the very point of the article is the Swedish government/king exercising power (in some cases far) outside present-day Sweden. --Ypsilon (talk) 15:48, 16 October 2024 (UTC)[reply]
The 24-month cooldown is in any case just a recommendation, and it is suitable to schedule this article for 2025, as the Jewish community celebrates a multiple anniversary. /Yvwv (talk) 17:26, 16 October 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Place: Gemstones
Blurb: Many travellers buy gems or jewellery during their journeys. (should not exceed ~145 characters)
Article status: Guide (must be guide or above).
Time to feature: any
Nominated by: Pashley (talk) 20:38, 3 October 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Comment: There are both some fine bargains to be had and some incredibly bad "tourist trap" deals.
Nomination
Chinese jade pendant
I did a web search & added some I found.
No doubt more could be done. Pashley (talk) 18:04, 1 November 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Place: E69
Blurb: European Highway E69 goes through barren landscapes to the world's northernmost point you can reach by car (should not exceed ~145 characters)
Article status: Guide (must be guide or above).
Time to feature: May (given that FTTs go on the Main Page towards the end of the month)-Aug
Nominated by: Ypsilon (talk) 19:49, 13 October 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Comment: A nice little itinerary largely written by a voyager from the other side of the world. It's an interesting drive, and the landscapes are different from much of the rest of the Nordic countries, so definitely something to showcase on the Main Page.
Nomination
  • Support as nominator. --Ypsilon (talk) 19:49, 13 October 2024 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support Hey thanks for the nomination :-). --SHB2000 (t | c | m) 20:51, 13 October 2024 (UTC)[reply]
  • Comment. - While I Support the article in terms of content, I think we need to take a break from featuring Nordic countries' articles for a bit. We've featured an itinerary from at least one of Finland, Sweden, and Norway every year since 2021, which is a much higher feature rate than what most other countries have. I'd say we should wait on this article at least a year or so and give other countries' itineraries a chance, especially if we run the Jewish Stockholm Tour article in 2025/early 2026 (although I know someone commented on that post that we should wait until 2027 for that article). Tuyuhun (talk) 08:32, 16 October 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Well, the problem is that sadly we don't have that many topic articles (topics, itineraries, airports, phrasebooks etc.) left that are 1. both at guide or Star status and 2. we haven't featured as FTT and 3. haven't earlier been deemed not good enough for the Main Page, with little to none development on them thereafter.
Those that remain are just from a few corners of the world (aside of phrasebooks, most are from the U.S., Northern Europe, Japan and Australia) and we have even less topics not bound to any specific part of the world - such as Gemstones above. Sure, we do have some geographical diversity when it comes to articles of the same type like airports and cuisine articles, however we likewise usually try to keep one year between articles of the same type.
Therefore I've tried to stuff a couple of Northern European articles in the summer slots when it's the best time of the year to visit here to save eligible articles for the rest of the year. --Ypsilon (talk) 15:41, 16 October 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Articles featured on Wikitravel up to 2012 are unofficial, and eligible to feature again. (See Wikivoyage_talk:Destination_of_the_month_candidates/Archive/2019-2023#Shall_features_before_2013_be_seen_as_unofficial?) That gives us some more candidates. However, rather few of those are travel topics; see Previous_Featured_travel_topics#Unofficial_features. /Yvwv (talk) 20:11, 16 October 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Place: Sound of Music
Blurb: Hollywood's 1965 depiction of the Austrian Trapp Family is one of the most successful musicals ever, though not in Austria itself. It is a great showcase of Salzburg and the Alps. (should not exceed ~145 characters)
Article status: Guide (must be guide or above).
Time to feature: Spring or summer. 2025 is the film's 60th anniversary. Not sure whether there are public events dedicated to the film.
Nominated by: Yvwv (talk) 23:32, 3 November 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Comment: We have had surprisingly few features from Austria. Previous versions of the country's article (and its blurb in Central Europe) have criticized the film's stereotypic depictions of the country. This article was recently expanded to give background on the real Trapp family, the German film about them, and the inaccuracies and controversies of Sound of Music. Some more information about how to find and visit the venues might be useful.
Nomination
  • Comment. I don't think the musical had anything to do with Hollywood, so the blurb needs tweaking. –LPfi (talk) 07:32, 7 November 2024 (UTC)[reply]
  • Very very close - as discussed on the talk page, a couple of more photos would be nice. Moreover, some of the listings in the end of the article have quite short descriptions. --Ypsilon (talk) 10:14, 7 November 2024 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support. I watched this film many times as a child,and have much enjoyed doing my share of work on this article to complete it and address all the issues listings-wise, and at this moment it has attained a good shape. It must be mentioned that the term "Hollywood version" is very much used throughout the article, synonymous with "American version", to disambiguate from the 1956 "German version". This metonym is not very accurate, as 20th Century Studios are in Century City and not Hollywood, but I don't see it as an issue that could prevent the article of making FTT. Ibaman (talk) 10:54, 20 November 2024 (UTC)[reply]
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