It’s a bucket list like no other – all 1,223 Unesco World Heritage sites.
And American couple Haley Crowley and Zachary Fisher are determined to visit every single one.
The pair have visited 114 sites so far and have been documenting their travels on their @haleyandzach_ TikTok account, where they’ve raked in over 80,000 followers.
They reveal to MailOnline Travel the ups and downs of their odyssey, including the two best and worst sites and the places that surprised them.
Haley and Zach’s ‘Unesco hunt’ has taken them to 58 countries, from Montenegro and Myanmar to Chile, Cambodia and China. They said: ‘It forces us to truly explore a country and, in turn, has led us to have some crazy experiences.’
Haley Crowley and Zachary Fisher are on a ‘lifelong quest’ to visit every Unesco World Heritage Site. The pair have visited 114 sites so far and have been documenting their travels on their @haleyandzach_ TikTok account. The couple are pictured above in Torun, Poland
The couple’s ‘Unesco hunt’ has taken them to 58 countries, from Montenegro and Myanmar to Chile, Cambodia and China. One of their favourite spots is The Great Wall of China (above)
Haley is pictured left at The Great Wall of China, which the couple described as ‘incredible’. The pair are pictured right sliding down the Great Wall on the Mutianyu toboggan
The couple’s number one spot on the extensive list is The Great Wall of China, perhaps the country’s most iconic landmark, which was constructed during the Ming Dynasty and spans over 13,000 miles.
The couple said: ‘You hear about the wall, how big it is, how far it stretches, but to see it twist and wind through the mountains as far as your eye can see. Truly incredible.’
Another standout site for the couple is Old Bagan, an ancient city in the Mandalay Region of Myanmar, which served as the capital of the Pagan Kingdom from the 9th to 13th centuries.
The city was once home to more than 10,000 Buddhist temples, pagodas and monasteries at its peak. Today, the ruins of over 2,000 temples and pagodas remain.
The couple said: ‘Due to the civil war in Myanmar, we were some of the only tourists and often had these incredible sites all to ourselves.’
Some ‘honourable mentions’, according to the couple, are Angkor Wat, a Hindu-Buddhist temple complex in Siem Riep, Cambodia; Machu Picchu in Peru; and the Plain of Jars in Laos, an archaeological landscape known for its thousands of large stone jars.
One standout site for the couple is Old Bagan, an ancient city in the Mandalay Region of Myanmar, which served as the capital of the Pagan Kingdom
The couple said: ‘Due to the civil war in Myanmar, we were some of the only tourists and often had incredible sites all to ourselves.’ They’re pictured left with a local in Old Bagan
Haley is pictured above at the Plain of Jars in Laos, an archaeological landscape known for its thousands of large stone jars
They also highlighted Upper Svaneti, a region in the mountainous area of Georgia renowned for its well-preserved medieval villages.
While Haley and Zach’s quest has led them to plenty of incredible places, they noted: ‘Some of the sites are much better preserved or restored than others.’
One of their least favourite spots is the Chinchorro mummies in Arica, northern Chile. They are the oldest examples of artificially mummified human remains, having been buried up to 2,000 years before the Egyptian mummies. They said: ‘It is interesting, but how can it stack up to Macchu Picchu?’
Another site that failed to live up to their expectations is Tiwanaku, a pre-Columbian civilisation that existed between 300 AD and 1100 AD.
The city, which is located in current-day Bolivia near Lake Titicaca, was one of the most significant Andean civilisations. It now contains several ruins, including the Akapana Pyramid and the Kalasasaya Temple, but, according to Haley and Zach: ‘There is not much left of it to see.’
The couple have also been surprised by several sites, including The Sewell Mining Town, which is located 2,200 metres (7,217ft) above sea level in the Andes and sits above the world’s largest underground copper mine, El Teniente.
Tiwanaku (above), a pre-Columbian civilisation that existed between 300 AD and 1100 AD, failed to live up to the couple’s expectations. They said: ‘There’s not much left to see’
The pair mentioned the Angkor Wat temple complex in Cambodia as one of their favourite Unesco sites. Hayley is pictured above at the site
They said: ‘The effort and energy to be able to build this city this high up in the Andes truly impressed us.’
Kotor, a fortified town on Montenegro’s Adriatic coast, also blew them away. They described it as ‘incredibly beautiful’ and, in a TikTok video, claimed it had ‘the best views in Montenegro’.
Haley and Zach have been travelling the world full-time since 2022 and are funding their ‘huge trip’ with their savings. They said: ‘Both of us got jobs straight out of university and saved aggressively.
‘We have started to earn some money from social media, but it is a very small amount.’
Their day-to-day typically requires multiple bus rides, hitchhiking or lots of walking to get to a Unesco site or a nearby city.
They said: ‘The more remote sites are usually not very straightforward to access and this makes it hard to plan. A lot of ‘planning’ requires speaking to locals as there is not always readily available information online.’
They travel on a budget and stay in hostels, guesthouses or couch surf – which they typically book just hours before they arrive in each city.
The couple have been surprised by several sites, including The Sewell Mining Town, which is located 2,200 metres above sea level in the Andes (above)
The couple described Kotor, a fortified town on Montenegro’s Adriatic coast, as ‘incredibly beautiful’
Haley is pictured left in Upper Svaneti, a region in the mountainous area of Georgia renowned for its well-preserved medieval villages. Zach is pictured right exploring the Bay of Kotor
While moving around so often can feel ‘exhausting’, the pair said: ‘We absolutely love this type of travelling, and even when things go wrong, we always laugh about it later.’
What has been their favourite part of the journey? ‘All of the people we have met along the way,’ the couple said.
‘We have been helped by total strangers who have given us rides when we were in the middle of nowhere, fed us, and housed us for the night simply because we are in their town and want to get to know us.’
Unesco sites are landmarks and areas protected and recognised by the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization for their cultural-historical or scientific value.
Countries that have signed up to the World Heritage Convention can submit proposals for sites they want to be recognised, and the list is updated every year.
