Yough Pioneer Tours
Blog
Welcome to the Young Pioneer Tours blog about everything North Korea, and all of our other special off the beaten the track destinations.
Since starting in 2008 we have seen blogging about North Korea and our other great destinations as a great way to engage with our customers and to show the world a slice of life in the great destinations we visit.
Due to the mass amount of great content we create, as well as receive from our Pioneers we have since started our travel lifestyle magazine “The Young Pioneer”.
We’re always looking for contributors to our sites, so feel free to browse through our blogs, and , get in touch if you’d like to write for us.
Check out and subscribe to the YPT Blog and travel magazine
The Top 6 Exclaves to Visit
January 10, 2020 / by John McGovern
There are numerous exclaves and enclaves around the world on a national or subnational level, many of which are in the US and Canada or Western Europe, so we won’t bother you with those. Instead, here’s YPT’s Guide to the top exclaves you should have o …
The YPT Guide to Exclaves and Enclaves
January 10, 2020 / by John McGovern
Here at YPT we love a bit of odd geography and international politics, from borderlands and autonomous regions to unrecognised countries, terra nullius and of course micronations. So it is that we’re pretty obsessed with the phenomenon of exclaves and …
The Mongolian ger: the traditional Mongolian tent
January 9, 2020 / by Gareth Johnson
The Mongolians are historically a nation of nomads. This was true in Genghis Khan’s time, and it’s still true for 40% of the modern population. But being a nomad does not exempt someone from the need for shelter – particularly with the harsh Mongolian …
Ulaanbaatar: capital of Mongolia
January 8, 2020 / by Gareth Johnson
Great for a Scrabble hand with a few too many vowels, Mongolia’s capital of Ulaanbaatar (sometimes spelled as ‘Ulan Bator’) is the capital city of a country that, sadly, doesn’t see as much tourism as it should. We give you the lowdown on this quirky c …
Gobi Desert Facts: the ‘waterless place’
January 8, 2020 / by Gareth Johnson
The Gobi Desert is Asia’s largest and most iconic, covering over 1600km (1000 miles) of China and Mongolia. It has long been a region that acted as a natural barrier between the various countries of the area, limiting the movement of troops, ordnance a …
CONIFA 2020: the final 16 revealed!
January 8, 2020 / by Gareth Johnson
January 8th, 2020 Our partners at the Confederation of Independent Football Associations (CONIFA) — AKA the Other World Cup — recently announced the 16 teams that have qualified for this year’s World Cup. Taking place between May 30th and June 7th 20 …
Update on YPT Tours to Iraq and Iran
January 8, 2020 / by Nicolas Platt
On the 3rd of January, a US drone strike killed top Iranian general Qassem Suleimani. In the early hours of the 8th of January Iran launched ballistic missile attacks on US bases in Iraq and Kurdistan. Iraq has also been experiencing months of protests …
What is the Eurasian Adventure?
January 7, 2020 / by Gareth Johnson
Here at YPT we have a few tours that we’d consider flagship – May Day in North Korea, the Least Visited Countries tour, Chernobyl/Transnistria – but by far our biggest and most impressive is the Eurasian Adventure. But what, exactly, is the Eurasian Ad …
Manchukuo: Japan’s puppet empire within China
January 6, 2020 / by Gareth Johnson
At Young Pioneer Tours we do like our unrecognised and former countries, and we indeed visit many of them. There is one sorta-country that we’ve regrettably neglected until now: the Japanese puppet state of Manchukuo. Manchukuo was founded by the Empir …
