NATURE INVENTION

five Most Unusual City Names Around The World

January 11, 2009 by dolce
Filed under Destinations, Featured

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Looking for your next adventure in a new city? Some of these cities might not have been heard of or can be easily pronounced, but can be an interesting conversation by the water cooler. This is our top five list of unusual city names across the globe.

1. Chicken Island, Thailand-If you are as big a fan as we are of The Amazing Race, you might recall this as a leg in Season One. I wish I could say this is the best place to get chicken (Who knows, maybe it is) but, the island got its name from the strange formation of rocks. Chicken Island is only a place to visit, there is no accommodation for this island.

2.Christmas Island, Australia-Here is another bad joke “But I thought Christmas started in the North Pole with Santa, not Christmas Island?” Christmas Island is actually a territory of Australia in the Indian Ocean. The Island is very green with 63% of the island being the National Park. With a population of only 1600 inhabitants, this might be a unique place to be for New Years. Why is that? Well, they have the right to say they are the first city to bring in the New Year before everyone else celebrates at midnight.

3.Taumatawhakatangihangakoauauotamateapokaiwhenuakitanatahu, New Zealand- No I’m not keyboard mashing, this is an actual name for a city located in Southern New Zealand. It is also the 7th longest word in the English language. So far, all we know is that there is a hill located in this city. With a name that long, its enough for me to check that out! I’d just hate to ask for directions!

4.LLANFAIRWLLGWYNGLLGOGERYYCHWYRNDROBWILLLLANTYSILIOGOGOGOCH, Wales- If number 3 wasn’t strange enough for you, try getting directions for this town. A very small city in Wales thought of a clever way to attract tourists. Its previous name was 20 letters long so they decided to make the name longer and voila! Tourists started to flock to visit this strange city. For some reason, the city is named in all capital letters. I guess they are loud and proud to say

“Welcome to LLANFAIRWLLGWYNGLLGOGERYYCHWYRNDROBWILLLLANTYSILIOGOGOGOCH”

5. Unalaska, Alaska- I guess if you are too lazy to move out of your state, just change your city to Un-Alaska. I’m sure thats not why they are called Un-Alaska, but there are about 4000 Un-Alaskans. If you’re looking to send your kids to a good school,The Unalaska City School was voted one of the best 100 school districts in the United States by Offspring Magazine. It might be a bit cold up there, for the city is located in Aleutian islands of Alaska, the strip of Alaska broken up into islands. With about 250 rainy days a year, Unalaska is also the rainiest place in the United States.