TripAdvisor names Georgia city as one of the ‘Best of the Best Destinations’ for 2024
ByWSBTV.com News Staff
Top best small cities in US #5: People gather at the Forsythe Park fountain in the historic district of Savannah, Ga. Lured by the city's time-capsule collection of antebellum homes and manicured public squares, tourists spent an estimated $2.8 billion here in 2016. (AP Photo/David Goldman, File) (David Goldman/AP)
(David Goldman/AP)
ByWSBTV.com News Staff
SAVANNAH, Ga. — If you are planning a spring break or already looking ahead to summer vacation, you’re probably scanning the travel blogs and websites for a list of an ideas.
When it comes to destinations right here in the United States to visit, TripAdvisor says there’s one Georgia city near the top of the list.
The travel website named Savannah among the top cities for its 2024 Best of the Best Travelers Choice Awards.
How are the Travelers Choice Awards decided? The travel website analyzed a high volume of “above-and-beyond” reviews from Tripadvisor users within the past year.
“Out of our 8 million listings, fewer than 1% achieve this milestone,” according to the travel site.
The Travelers Choice Awards breaks down the top 25 destinations into the following categories: trending destinations, top destinations, nature destinations, food destinations, culture destinations, honeymoon destinations and sustainable destinations.
Savannah finished at No. 5 in the food category and No. 18 in the top destination category. Why did Savannah make the list?
TripAdvisor users cite the seafood and Southern comfort food scene combined with the historical and haunting sites that the 250-year-old city has to offer.
Forbidden places 1. Area 51 - $2,280 penalty. It is one of the most well-known military bases in the U.S. but few can see what goes on at the top-secret Air Force base. (LPETTET /iStock)
Forbidden places 2. Vatican Secret Archive - $275 penalty. The Vatican Secret Archive, also known as the Vatican Apostolic Archives, was one of the focal points of Dan Brown's "The DaVinci Code. The only person who has free use of the archives is the pope who is technically the owner. It is open to scholars, according to the Vatican. (alxpin /iStock)
Forbidden places 3. Little Hall’s Pond Cay - $50 penalty. A small island in the Bahamas had been the home of Jack Sparrow himself, Johnny Depp before he sold it to "Harry Potter" author J.K. Rowling, investing.com said. It is a private island. (Google Maps/Google)
Forbidden places 4. Vale do Javari - undisclosed penalty. Brazil's government declared it illegal for anyone who is not from Vale do Javari to enter the territory. (Google Maps/Google)
Forbidden places 5. Korean Demilitarized Zone - $155 penalty. The DMZ is the land between North and South Korea and is an active war zone, according to investing.com. (momcilog/iStock)
Forbidden places 6. Maya Bay - undisclosed penalty. Maya Bay, while it may sound like it is in Mexico, it is actually in Indonesia and was made famous by the film "The Beach." The film inspired so many tourists that 80% of the coral reefs were killed, and led to the prohibition of tourists, according to investing.com (tawatchaiprakobkit/iStock)
Forbidden places 7. Aksai Chin - $500-$1,000 fine. The land is disputed between China and India. China claimed it in 2023, in a "standard map" that shows the region officially theirs, Reuters reported. There has been clashes over the years, one in 2020 that left 20 Indian soldiers and four Chinese dead. (sutana sutana/iStock)
Forbidden places 8. Bohemian Grove - $1,000 fine or 6 months in jail. Business is not allowed in the grove, neither are trespassers at the secret society in Monte Rio, California. (Google Maps/Google)
Forbidden places 9. Google Data Centers - $500-$5,000 penalty depending on location. Google has data hubs all over the world but only people who work there can be on the property. (DutchScenery/iStock)
Forbidden places 10. Chapel of the Tablet - $25 to $250 - The chapel in Aksum, Ethiopia is supposed to be the where the Ark of the Covenant is held. One person is allowed to see the Ark in the church's catacombs, according to investing.com (mtcurado/iStock)
Forbidden places 11. Chauvet Cave - up to $16,000 penalty. The caves are home to one of the best prehistoric paintings. The general public are not allowed to tour it because of the historical significance, according to investing.com. (Raphael GAILLARDE/Gamma-Rapho/Getty Images)
Forbidden places 12. Tillamook Rock Lighthouse - $1,000 penalty. Tillamook Rock Lighthouse is inactive, and is on a rock about a mile off the Oregon shore. (GCosby/iStock)
Forbidden places 13. Langley - $2,500 fine or 1 year in prison. Langley is technically an unincorporated town in McLean, Virginia, but it is also the CIA Headquarters. (UM Images/Universal Images Group/Getty Images)
Forbidden places 14. Fort Knox - $1,000 or 6 to 12 months in prison. Fort Knox is an Army installation but is best known for holding half of the U.S. Treasury's gold. (Kiyoshi Tanno/iStock)
Forbidden places 15. Pluto's Gate - undisclosed penalty. Pluto's Gate (Ploutonion at Hierapolis) was a "religious sanctuary" for the worshipers of Pluto and a portal to the underworld for both Greek and Romans. The exterior is open to visitors but the cannot go into the cave. (wildart/iStock)
Forbidden places 16. Poveglia - $30 to $300 penalty. Poveglia dates back to 421 A.D. and was inhabited until 1379. Eventually a mental hospital was opened on the island in the 1922. When it closed, rumors of it being haunted began. (Wirestock/iStock)
Forbidden places 17. Niihau Island - Up to $1,000 penalty. Investing.com says about 84 people live on the Hawaiian island, each are native to the state and have their own dialect of the language. It is privately owned. (Google /Google)
Forbidden places 18. Chichen Itza Pyramid - $5,856 penalty. You can visit the pyramid from the outside, but you cannot climb it or go inside. (Csondy/iStock)
Forbidden places 19. Surtsey - undisclosed penalty. Surtsey is a volcanic island in Iceland. It is protected by UNESCO for most visitors since it formed in the 1960s. (elleon /iStock)
Forbidden places 20. Grand Shrine of Ise - $712 or 3 years in prison. The shrine honors Amaterasu the Solar Goddess and while visitors can see the outside of the shrine, they cannot go inside, according to investing.com. (duncan1890/iStock)
Forbidden places 21. Mezhgorye - undisclosed penalty. Mezhgorye (Mezhgorya), according to investing.com, "is a small, secretive town" that could be home to a Russian nuclear base. (Google Maps/Google)
Forbidden places 22. North Sentinel Island - potential death. The few people who live on North Sentinel Island live in isolation and will defend their land by force, investing.com said. (DigitalGlobe/Getty Images)
Forbidden places 23. Svalbard Global Seed Vault - undisclosed penalty. The seed vault in Norway protects the world's seeds of millions of plants as what investing.com called an "insurance polity for its food supplies." You can visit the outside of the $9 million building but cannot go inside with out permission. (Øyvind Breyholtz/iStock)
Forbidden places 24. Mausoleum of Qin Shi Huang - Death possibly. The mausoleum of the first Qin Emperor is said to contain deadly traps, causing the inside of his final resting place never to be excavated. (Jinli Guo/iStock)
Forbidden places 25. Morgan Island - $5,000 penalty. The South Carolina island is a nature preserve, home to free-range rhesus monkeys and people are not allowed to visit. (Google /Google)
Forbidden places 26. Pravcicka Brana - $9.21 for trespassing after dark. Pravcicka Brana is a thin rock formation and a large sandstone arch in the Czech Republic. You can't cross the arch but can see it from a distance. (Ondrej Prosicky/iStock)
Forbidden places 27. Iiha da Queimada Granda - death. You could die by going to Iiha da Queimada Granda. Not because of people or the government, but because of the massive amounts of snake that live on the island called, what else, but "Snake Island." (Sostenes Pelegrini/iStock)
Forbidden places 28. Lascaux Caves - up to $16,000. The caves include more than 600 prehistoric cave paintings on the walls and ceilings. They had been a tourist site but the number of visitors had an adverse effect on the paintings, according to investing.com. (Raphael GAILLARDE/Gamma-Rapho /Getty Images)
Forbidden places 29. Heard and McDonald Island - $1,500 penalty. The islands are in the Southern Ocean between Antarctic and Australia. It is protected as a World Heritage Convention. (Inger Vandyke /VW PICS/Universal Images Group/Getty Images)
Forbidden places 30. Bhangarh Fort $6.07 penalty after dark. The fort is in India and was constructed in the 1500s, housing up to 10,000 people. Then one night it was deserted and is rumored to be cursed, according to investing.com. Visitors can go during the day, but it is prohibited at night. (Meinzahn /iStock)
Forbidden places 31. North Brother Island - $250 or 15 days in jail. The New York island is near Rikers Island prison and had been a drug rehab before it was abandoned in 1963. It is now a bird sanctuary. (Google Maps/Google)
Forbidden places 32. Bank of England vaults - up to $2,600 fine. The Bank of England's vaults hold 400,000 gold bars or about $257 billion worth. ( EDDIE MULHOLLAND/POOL/AFP /Getty Images)
Forbidden places 33. Coca-Cola Vault - $1,000 or 1 year in jail. You can see the vault where the recipe for Coke is kept at the World of Coke in Atlanta, but you can't go inside it. (Natalie Dreier/Cox Media Group National Content Desk)
Forbidden places 34. Navassa Island - undisclosed penalty. The 2.1 square mile island has been abandoned since the late 1800s, according to investing.com. (Bildagentur-online/Universal Images Group/Getty Images)
Forbidden places 35. Diego Garcia - $500 fine or 6 months in prison. Diego Garcia is a militarized territory of the U.K. (roc8jas/iStock)
Forbidden places 37. Plymouth, Montserrat - $2,700 or 4 months in prison. The town is a ghost town after being evacuated in the 1990s after a nearby volcano erupted. Some areas can be visited, but others are prohibited. (Derek Galon/iStock)
Forbidden places 38. Albatross Island - $2,500 fine or 1 year in prison. The island is known for the birds the land mass is named for, the albatross. They are vulnerable so humans are not allowed on the island. (Radoslav Cajkovic /iStock)
Forbidden places 39. Dulce Base - $500 fine or 6 months in prison. Dulce Base has been the center of conspiracy theories since the Cold War. (Google Maps/Google)
Forbidden places 40. Woomera Prohibited Area - $2,500 fine or 1 year in prison. Prohibited is in the name of this location, which is a civil aerospace and military facility in Australia. (MORGAN SETTE/AFP /Getty Images)
