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As the century closes there seem fewer and fewer exotic destinations that have survived our era of overtourism. Other remote places that a resourceful traveler could rummage around in 20 years ago may, due to political upheavals, remain off-limits for our lifetimes.

In 1984, at the end of an Indian journalism assignment and just before the summer monsoon, I left an overheated Delhi and flew north to Srinagar, in the Vale of Kashmir, to relax for a week among the ethereal lakes and mountains. Who then could have predicted that one of the most beautiful places on Earth, the Kashmir of transcendental serenity and the enchanted name, would soon close down and become a no-go area for foreigners, with a reputation for kidnappings and unleashed political violence?

—Anthony Weller

Read “Dream of Kashmir,” Weller’s account of visiting a very different Kashmir than today’s, in the January/February 2000 issue of TRAVELER.