International Day for Monuments and Sites (World Heritage Day)

A heritage site is a place of cultural significance. It preserves the legacy of intangible attributes and physical artifacts of a society or group that is inherited from previous generations. The International Day on Monuments and Sites, also known as World Heritage Day and endorsed by UNESCO in 1983, is to raise awareness of the diversity of the world’s heritage and the efforts that are required to protect and conserve it, to draw attention to the vulnerability of these places, and to celebrate the work of the International Council on Monuments and Sites (ICOMOS). The Day involves a range of activities, conferences and visits to heritage sites and monuments. The World Heritage List includes over 1,100 sites globally. While on this continent be sure to visit Australia’s World Heritage listings (some of which have multiple sites):

• Australian Convict Sites
• Australian Fossil Mammal Sites
• Budj Bim Cultural Landscape
• Fraser Island
• Gondwana Rainforests of Australia
• Great Barrier Reef
• Greater Blue Mountains
• Heard and McDonald Islands
• Kakadu National Park
• Lord Howe Island Group
• Macquarie Island
• Purnululu National Park
• Royal Exhibition Building and Carlton Gardens
• Shark Bay, Western Australia
• Sydney Opera HouseTasmanian Wilderness
• The Ningaloo Coast
• Uluru – Kata Tjuta National Park
• Wet Tropics of Queensland
• Willandra Lakes Region

See also the Australian Heritage Database.