10 Of The Least Popular Vacation Destinations

BHUTAN

THE CASE FOR: Beautiful, holy, and weird, Bhutan is somewhat similar to Liechtenstein in that it is an odd little constitutional monarchy bordered by two much bigger countries (in this case India and China). Where Liechtenstein deals in money and boredom, however, Bhutan deals in culture and fun, having been ranked the happiest country in Asia in 2006 and being the only nation on Earth to measure Gross National Happiness.

THE CASE AGAINST: Getting into Bhutan is a tightly regulated process that demands that visitors first go through a complicated visa system before buying a "tour package" that provides food and shelter but costs a minimum of $200 a day in the off season. You are required to have a guide as part of the package system, lest unscrupulous tourists try and steal some happiness. Lastly, for cultural reasons there are penises drawn everywhere, so if that's a dealbreaker for you maybe try Liechtenstein.

THE MARSHALL ISLANDS

THE CASE FOR: The far-scattered archipelagoes of the Marshall Islands are a diver's paradise, littered with well-preserved shipwrecks and gorgeous atolls. Crime is virtually nonexistent and while lodgings may be hard to find, they can still be had at moderate rates in guest houses. Perhaps best of all, there will be few other tourists to bother you while you're there.

THE CASE AGAINST: The main reason there aren't a lot of tourists is that a United Airlines flight (the only one available) is bare minimum $2000. The other reason may be related to the fact that the Marshalls (and inadvertently the Marshallese natives) were used as a test bed for some of America's biggest and craziest nuclear weapons. Pack a Geiger counter!

SÃO TOMÉ AND PRÍNCIPE

THE CASE FOR: As the world's smallest Portuguese-speaking country (Portugal already being pretty small to begin with) the two-island nation of São Tomé and Príncipe is a unique and largely untouched culture, boasting gorgeous beaches, rich jungles, excellent food, and friendly locals. Fans of geography will want to check out the Ilhéu das Rolas resort, a tiny island just to the south of São Tomé that the equator runs directly through.

THE CASE AGAINST: Getting to São Tomé and Príncipe makes getting to the Marshall Islands look like taking a bus from Boston to New York. Only a handful of small airlines service the island and the most "convenient" flight out of Equatorial Guinea has the distinction of being so sketchy they are banned from European airspace. Alternatively, you may try and rent passenger space on one of the small cargo vessels that putter back and forth between the island and the continent.

NORTH KOREA

THE CASE FOR: If you've ever wanted an entire country to try and impress you, check out tourism opportunities for the DPRK, a nation that will go to bizarre and ridiculous lengths to pretend it is not a weird totalitarian dystopia. Although recently North Korea has done a lot of hand-waving about how they are still technically at war with their eye-rolling neighbors to the South, they're still trying to develop their infant tourism agency, and given that a ten percent tip might feed someone's extended family for a year you can be sure of excellent service. There's reportedly a karaoke bar called "The Diplomatic Restaurant" which could not possibly fail to be the weirdest and most memorable karaoke experience of your life.

THE CASE AGAINST: You are accompanied by not one but two government minders/propaganda agents at all times (they use the bathroom in shifts). If Kim Jong-Un decides against all odds to drop the hammer and ride the lightning, you are going to be in an extremely precarious diplomatic position assuming you survive the initial counterattack. Lastly, Kim Jong-Il reputedly was fond of kidnapping beautiful Japanese starlets, so for all the Japanese starlets reading this website: watch your backs.

NAURU

THE CASE FOR: Nauru's total tourism numbers are barely in the quadruple digits, so in any casual discussion of exotic Pacific destinations you will hold the ultimate trump card ("Oh, the Marshall Islands? How cute"). The second-smallest country in the world (and really, why do we bother counting the Vatican as a country?), you will be immediately identified as "the tourist" and everyone inside and outside of the fledgling tourist industry will bend over backwards to help you out.

Nauru is so economically depressed that if you asked the right people you could probably rent the island and its 10,000 citizens for a week or two-perfect for a high school reunion or large-scale drug smuggling operation.

THE CASE AGAINST: With two hotels and three restaurants (two restaurants actually being located in one of the hotels) you are going to run out of non-diving stuff to do really fast. The interior of the island is one gigantic blasted gravel pit due to its prior occupation as a phosphate mine. The country is also so outlandishly small and obscure that your attempts to one-up people tourism-wise may backfire if they assume you're just making it up.

TUVALU

THE CASE FOR: A beautiful Polynesian paradise, Tuvalu's department of tourism's motto is "Timeless Tuvalu," which is tragically incorrect-being only a few feet above sea level on average, Tuvalu is expected to be the first country to disappear if the oceans rise any higher, and arrangements are already under way to evacuate the lower islands.

That means if you book your flight today, you might be one of the last to visit a disappearing country. Only about a thousand tourists visit Tuvalu each year, many of them to appreciate the country's ecotourism initiatives and probably at least a few of them for bragging rights after the sea finally reclaims its property.

THE CASE AGAINST: The single Tuvaluan airport is served by only a few airlines and is often swamped by heavy seas. Although tourism sites claim that there was at least one hotel on the main island of Funafuti by the airport, the Tuvaluan tourism's "Accommodations" page leads to an ominous error message. It may well be effectively too late to visit the world's most recent lost undersea civilization

SIERRA LEONE

THE CASE FOR: The "Land of the Mountain Lion" is known for its hospitality, gorgeous beaches, delicious food, and temperate climate. While its tourism industry is still in its infant stages, nearly 55,000 people visited the West African island last year, and with the proliferation of visa-offering embassies in the capital city of Freetown it's a good starting point for an African tour.

The airport has flights to and from London, Paris, and Brussels, as well as other routes into the West African coastal states. Most of all the horrible atrocities people associate with Sierra Leone are now a full ten years in the past. Hooray!

THE CASE AGAINST: Outside of the capital, electricity, roads, and fresh water are spotty. Cholera outbreaks are still a possibility. There is a non-zero chance someone will hack pieces off of you with a machete as a means of resolving conflict.

CHAD

THE CASE FOR: Zakouma National Park contains a large and exotic hunting ground where, if you are a horrible person, you can probably bribe your way into illegally hunting elephants for their tusks. The park is also said to contain a number of interestingly large rocks which you might appreciate for their natural beauty while you take a break from illegally hunting elephants for their tusks.

United Nations data indicates that 25,000 people visited Chad in 2009 so maybe they know something we don't (although we're just going to guess that they are there to illegally hunt elephants for their tusks).

THE CASE AGAINST: Unlike Sierra Leone, Chad is still pretty much an active war zone. Also unlike Sierra Leone, Chad is a land-locked country in the middle of the African continent and therefore lacks any beautiful coastlines or even just okay coastlines. It is also one of the most corrupt countries in the world, which might be a positive if you are a horrible person who is illegally hunting elephants for their tusks.