It's a fact of the traveller's life that you're going to get sick while you're on the road.

So writes Ben Abraham in the Sydney Morning Herald’s travel blog, which follows below.

Peru

There's some great food in Peru - ceviche is like God's gift to tongues. But uncooked fish isn't always the best thing for travellers, and there's some other stuff there that can make you violently ill. And it's not what you'd expect. I ate a guinea pig and was fine. I ate a hamburger and spent four days lying in a hotel room sweating like Renton's cold turkey scene in Trainspotting.

Vietnam

The first sign is the butcher on the side of the road with his wares laid out in bamboo baskets. Refrigeration's not big here. Then there are all the weird and wonderful things that are just eaten as a matter of course. Washed down with home-brewed street beer.

Uganda

It may not be typical, but the sickest I've ever been was in Uganda, and I assume it was something I ate, so that's what I associate the place with. For the record, the toilet blocks of a Kampala campsite aren't the best place in the world to spend your much-anticipated holiday.

Nepal
I've never actually been to Nepal, but I'm yet to meet anyone who hasn't come back from there without a horror story. My friends Russ and Rox had an unfortunate case of dual food poisoning in Kathmandu, and found that nothing brings a couple closer together than having to stand outside the bathroom waiting for your partner to finish vomiting so you can go in and have your turn.

Italy

Not food poisoning, as such. I just ate so much I felt sick. Every night.

Bangladesh
I love street food, and never had a bad experience in India, so when I visited Bangladesh, I was keen for some more of that action. That is, until the girl I was staying with put me off slightly. "See the open drains running next to them on the street," she said, pointing near the vendors' carts. "Where do you think they get their cooking water from? Don't. Eat. The street food." Plus, giardia is rife.

China

You can travel relatively safely in China. You can order food you recognise, or just spend your time solely at that bastion of communist ideals, KFC. Or, you can take a chance, and give everything a shot. Most of it will be delicious. But I defy anyone to plow through an entire Sichuan meal without it doing some atomic damage to their insides.

Thailand

There's a problem with Thai food: it all tastes so good. Meaning, you want to try everything. Every bizarre morsel you find in street stalls and markets and restaurants looks like it has to be eaten. The end result will be a few hours riding the porcelain, but it's usually worth it.

I've walked down Hollywood Boulevard in front of the Chinese Theatre. I bought a $2 map of the stars' houses and photographed the "foot prints" of Star Wars' R2D2 and C3PO in the cement. But I didn't touch anything.

That sidewalk made the list of the five germiest tourist spots in the world as determined by editors at TripAdvisor.com this summer:

1. Blarney Stone in Blarney, Ireland - Last year, about 400,000 people hung upside down to kiss this stone in their quest for the gift of eloquence.

2. Market Theater Gum Wall in Seattle, Washington - This 15'x50' wall of gum began as a few sticky pieces discarded by college students waiting in line for movie tickets fifteen years ago.

3. St. Mark's Square in Venice, Italy - For some reason, people love feeding the pigeons here, though city officials have been cracking down on the pooping menaces in recent years.

4. Grauman's Chinese Theatre in Hollywood, California - The celebrity handprints in the cement  out front encourage bare-hand contact with a city sidewalk, which, according to a Theatre tour guide, is mopped daily and pressure washed once a week to support the trend.

5. Oscar Wilde's Tomb in Paris, France - Admirers of author and playwright Oscar Wilde don bright lipstick to kiss his tomb when they come to pay their respects.

CNN's report of the list states,

"Though it is unlikely to get sick from visiting one of these places, health experts say germs are always a gamble. The more people who touch and visit a spot, the more germs there are in the mix, they say.

"Their traveling advice? Travelers should load up on hand sanitizers and wash their hands often on their trips."

Good advice, baseless assumptions. Now, what about the kissing? And the pigeons?

TripAdvisor travel expert Brooke Ferencsik was quoted as saying, "These places are great attractions regardless of the fact that they are germy."

I'd say they were good for a photo, maybe. But I'm passing on the hands-on (or mouth-on) participation.