Great Barrier Reef

The Great Barrier Reef is the world's largest coral reef system composed of over 2,900 individual reefs and 900 islands stretching for over 2,300 kilometres (1,400 mi) over an area of approximately 344,400 square kilometres (133,000 sq mi). The reef is located in the Coral Sea, off the coast of Queensland, Australia.

The Great Barrier Reef can be seen from outer space and is the world's biggest single structure made by living organisms. This reef structure is composed of and built by billions of tiny organisms, known as coral polyps. It supports a wide diversity of life and was selected as a World Heritage Site in 1981. CNN labeled it one of the seven natural wonders of the world. The Queensland National Trust named it a state icon of Queensland.

Fjordland National Park

Fiordland National Park occupies the southwest corner of the South Island of New Zealand. It is the largest of the 14 national parks in New Zealand, with an area of 12,500 km², and a major part of the Te Wahipounamu World Heritage site. The park is administered by the Department of Conservation. During the cooler past, glaciers carved many deep fiords, the most famous (and most visited) of which is Milford Sound. Other notable fiords include Doubtful Sound and Dusky Sound. From one of the peaks within Fiordland National Park, a view of Mount Aspiring/Tititea to the far north can be observed.

Crooked Forest in Poland

This grove of approximately 400 pines was planted around 1930, when its location was still within the German province of Pomerania. It is generally believed that some form of human tool or technique was used to make the trees grow this way, but the method and motive are not currently known.[1] It has been speculated that the trees may have been deformed to create naturally curved timber for use in furniture or boat building

Petra (Jordan)

Petra, a Greek word meaning stone, is a historical and archaeological city in the Jordanian governorate of Ma'an that is famous for its rock cut architecture and water conduit system. Established sometime around the 6th century BC as the capital city of the Nabataeans, it is a symbol of Jordan as well as its most visited tourist attraction. It lies on the slope of Mount Hor[3] in a basin among the mountains which form the eastern flank of Arabah (Wadi Araba), the large valley running from the Dead Sea to the Gulf of Aqaba. Petra has been a UNESCO World Heritage Site since 1985.

Palau Island

Palau officially the Republic of Palau is an island country located in the western Pacific Ocean. It is geographically part of the larger island group of Micronesia. The country's population of around 21,000 is spread across 250 islands forming the western chain of the Caroline Islands. The most populous island is Koror. The islands share maritime boundaries with Indonesia, the Philippines, and the Federated States of Micronesia. The capital Ngerulmud is located in Melekeok State on the nearby island of Babeldaob.

Aogashima island

Aogashima is a volcanic Japanese island in the Philippine Sea.[1] The island is administered by Tokyo and located approximately 358 kilometres (222 mi) south of Tokyo and 64 kilometres (40 mi) south of Hachijō-jima. It is the southernmost and most isolated inhabited island of the Izu archipelago.[2] The village of Aogashima administers the island under Hachijō Subprefecture of Tokyo Metropolis. As of 2014, the island's population was 170 on almost 9 km2. Aogashima is also within the boundaries of the Fuji-Hakone-Izu National Park.

Santorini

Santorini is an island in the southern Aegean Sea, about 200 km (120 mi) southeast of Greece's mainland. It is the largest island of a small, circular archipelago which bears the same name and is the remnant of a volcanic caldera. It forms the southernmost member of the Cyclades group of islands, with an area of approximately 73 km2 (28 sq mi) and a 2011 census population of 15,550. The municipality of Santorini comprises the inhabited islands of Santorini and Therasia and the uninhabited islands of Nea Kameni, Palaia Kameni, Aspronisi, and Christiana. The total land area is 90.623 km2 (34.990 sq mi). Santorini is part of the Thira regional unit

Lake Hillier

Lake Hillier is a lake on Middle Island, the largest of the islands and islets that make up the Recherche Archipelago, Western Australia. The most notable feature of the lake is its pink colour.

Horsetail Fall (Yosemite)

Horsetail Fall, located in Yosemite National Park in California, is a seasonal waterfall that flows in the winter and early spring. The fall occurs on the east side of El Capitan.[1] If Horsetail Fall is flowing in February and the weather conditions are just right, the setting sun illuminates the waterfall, making it glow orange and red.This natural phenomenon is often referred to as the "Firefall," a name that pays homage to the manmade Firefall that once took place in Yosemite. This waterfall descends in two streams side by side, the eastern one being the larger, but both quite small. The eastern one drops 470 m (1,540 ft) and the western one 480 m (1,570 ft), the highest fully airborne waterfall in Yosemite that runs at some point every year. The waters then gather and descend another 150 m (490 ft) on steep slabs, so the total height of these waterfalls is 620 m (2,030 ft) to 630 m (2,070 ft). The image shown here is taken during a brief time during the winter, near 21 February at sunset, made famous by Galen Rowell's photograph.

Chittorgarh Fort

Chittorgarh Fort (Hindi/Rajasthani: चित्तौड दुर्ग Chittorgarh Durg) is the largest fort in India and the grandest in the state of Rajasthan. It is a World Heritage Site. The fort, plainly known as Chittor, was the capital of Mewar and is today situated several kilometres south of Bhilwara. It was initially ruled by Guhilot and later by Sisodias, the Suryavanshi clans of Chattari Rajputs, from the 7th century, until it was finally abandoned in 1568 after the siege by Emperor Akbar in 1567. It sprawls majestically over a hill 180 m (590.6 ft) in height spread over an area of 280 ha (691.9 acres) above the plains of the valley drained by the Berach River. The fort precinct with an evocative history is studded with a series of historical palaces, gates, temples and two prominent commemoration towers. These monumental ruins have inspired the imagination of tourists and writers for centuries.

Saint Lucia Island

The volcanic island of Saint Lucia is more mountainous than many other Caribbean islands, with the highest point being Mount Gimie, at 950 metres (3,120 feet) above sea level. Two other mountains, the Pitons, form the island's most famous landmark. They are located between Soufrière and Choiseul on the western side of the island. Saint Lucia is also one of the few islands in the world that boasts a drive-in volcano.

Neuschwanstein Castle

Neuschwanstein Castle (German: Schloss Neuschwanstein, pronounced [nɔʏˈʃvaːnʃtaɪn], English: "New Swanstone Castle") is a nineteenth-century Romanesque Revival palace on a rugged hill above the village of Hohenschwangau near Füssen in southwest Bavaria, Germany. The palace was commissioned by Ludwig II of Bavaria as a retreat and as a homage to Richard Wagner. Ludwig paid for the palace out of his personal fortune and by means of extensive borrowing, rather than Bavarian public funds. The palace was intended as a personal refuge for the reclusive king, but it was opened to the paying public immediately after his death in 1886.Since then more than 61 million people have visited Neuschwanstein Castle. More than 1.3 million people visit annually, with as many as 6,000 per day in the summer.

Tunnel of Love

This gorgeous long, leafy tunnel looks like a green dream or a scene from a film - but it can actually be found deep in the forests of Ukraine. Located near the town of Kleven, this luscious green tunnel provides passage for a private train that provides wood to a local factory. Measuring 1.8 miles long, the unusual rail route in Eastern Europe is also a popular spot for lovers' promises. Read more: Ukraine's Leafy Green 'Tunnel of Love' is a Passageway for Trains and Lovers | Inhabitat - Sustainable Design Innovation, Eco Architecture, Green Building

Charleville Castle

Charleville Forest Castle is a Gothic-style castle located in County Offaly, Ireland, bordering the town of Tullamore, near the Shannon River. It is considered one of the finest of its type in the country.The land where the Charleville estate and castle were created is situated in Ireland's most ancient primordial oak woods, once the haunting grounds of Ireland's druids. In the 6th century it was part of the ancient monastic site of Lynally, which itself was in the ancient Durrow monastic settlement.

Bran Castle

 Bran Castle (Romanian: Castelul Bran; German: Törzburg; Hungarian: Törcsvár), situated near Bran and in the immediate vicinity of Braşov, is a national monument and landmark in Romania. The fortress is situated on the border between Transylvania and Wallachia, on DN73. Commonly known as "Dracula's Castle" (although it is one among several locations linked to the Dracula legend, including Poenari Castle and Hunyad Castle), it is marketed as the home of the titular character in Bram Stoker's Dracula. There is, however, no evidence that Stoker knew anything about this castle, which has only tangential associations with Vlad III, voivode of Wallachia, the putative inspiration for Dracula. As discovered by the Dutch author Hans Corneel de Roos, the location Bram Stoker actually had in mind for Castle Dracula while writing his novel was an empty mountain top, Mount Izvorul Călimanului, 2,033 m high, located in the Transylvanian Kelemen Alps near the former border with Moldavia.

Waitomo Caves

The Waitomo Caves is a village and solutional cave system forming a major tourist attraction in the northern King Country region of the North Island of New Zealand, 12 kilometres northwest of Te Kuiti. The community of Waitomo Caves itself is very small, though the village has many temporary service workers living there as well. The word Waitomo comes from the Māori language wai meaning water and tomo meaning a doline or sinkhole; it can thus be translated to be water passing through a hole. The caves are formed in Oligocene

Lake Kaindy - Sunken Forest in Kazakhstan

Lake Kaindy (Kazakh: Қайыңды көлі, Qayıñdı köli), meaning the "falling rocks/landslide lake"-- is a 400-meter-long (1,300 ft) lake in Kazakhstan that reaches depths near 30 meters (98 ft) in some areas. It is located 129 kilometers (80 mi) east-southeast of the city of Almaty and is 2,000 meters (6,600 ft) above sea level.

The lake was created as the result of an enormous limestone landslide, triggered by the 1911 Kebin earthquake.[1] The track to Lake Kaindy has many scenic views to the Saty Gorge, the Chilik Valley, and the Kaindy Gorge. Dried-out trunks of submerged Picea schrenkiana trees rise above the surface.

Tianzi Mountain

 Tianzi Mountain (天子山) is located in Zhangjiajie in the Hunan Province of China, close to the Suoxi Valley. It is named after the farmer Xiang Dakun of the Tujia ethnic group, who led a successful local farmers' revolt and called himself "tianzi". This means "son of Heaven" and is the traditional epithet of the Chinese emperor. It is also made out of marble.

Mar Sem Fim, Antarctica

Brazilian research yacht Mar Sem Fim sank while patrolling Antarctica on April 7th 2012. For over a year, the yacht was stuck not on the ocean floor itself, but under more than 10 feet of Antarctic sea ice, creating this amazing and truly unbelievable image.

While the crew of four was rescued during the sinking, the yacht itself spend more than a year under the Antarctic sea ice before it was recovered by a team of rescue divers in early 2013.

Weird Places: Socotra

Socotra Island

The largest island, also called Socotra, is about 95% of the landmass of the archipelago. It lies some 240 kilometres (150 mi) east of the Horn of Africa and 380 kilometres (240 mi) south of the Arabian Peninsula. The island is very isolated and a third of its plant life is found nowhere else on the planet. It has been described as "the most alien-looking place on Earth".