I have a certain fascination with micronations — places that are in many ways their own countries, but may or may not actually be recognized as actual countries. There are quite a few, ranging from abandoned gun platforms in the middle of the ocean to cities that have declared their independence. Some are easier to visit than others, but I’d love to make the attempt.

Sealand, for instance, is built on a gun platform left over from the UK’s defense efforts during World War II. A family living on the platform declared its national sovereignty in 1967 and the British courts supported their claim, due to the fact that platform is in international waters. Since then, Sealand has issued its own passports and money. However, visiting Sealand has never been easy and in the past few years, it’s become highly restricted. Sealand leases much of the island to HavenCo, an internet colocation service, which restricts access as a security precaution.

In contrast, Key West is a tourism haven and (debatably) an independent republic. The city declared itself the Conch Republic in the early 80s as a protest: the U.S. Border Patrol had created a roadblock and checkpoint on the highway from Key West to Florida, due to concerns that people could enter the U.S. through Key West. There have been other protests over the years, leading to Key West’s continuing ‘independence.’ It’s also used as a tourism booster and is a bit tongue-in-cheek: the motto on the flag of the Conch Republic reads ‘We seceded where others failed.’

I’ve been to a couple of places that view themselves as independent countries to a point, although it’s typically more an on-going joke than fact. I’ve got an ‘Independent Republic of Cork’ t-shirt — a legacy from the period of time when Ireland was fighting for independence. I’ve also been to the People’s Republic of Boulder and hung out in Gibraltar for a day. I’d love to see more, though. Considering the fact that over the past twenty years or so, creating micronations has become something of a fad, there are now plenty of places to visit. Australia alone has something like twenty of them. Of course, there are a few, like Andorra, which have existed for hundreds of years and are recognized by larger nations, like Andorra and San Marino.

Visiting many of these countries is a little harder than planning other trips, though. You usually have to arrange transportation to a country with an entirely different name and make arrangements from there. In many cases, you can have your passport stamped at the border, but the visa process can be far more complex: in the event that the micronation in question is someone’s personal property, you need an invitation to show up, rather than having the option of contacting an embassy and setting up a visit. For those micronations established with specific communities in mind, such as libertarians, you may have difficulty entering if you don’t ascribe to the appropriate beliefs or have the correct characteristics. To make things a bit easier, though, Lonely Planet has issued a guide book to micronations: Micronations by John Ryan, George Dunford and Simon Sellars (Amazon Associates). It’s a quirky guidebook to some even quirkier places.

Image — Wikimedia Commons