Blood Falls, Antarctica: A shockingly macabre shade of what looks like blood cascades down the pale face of Taylor Glacier. When scientists first discovered these falls in the McMurdo Dry Valleys in 1911, they thought algae colored the dark red water that spewed from a crack in the glacier. It turns out the hue comes from high iron levels in the falls’ source, a pool buried 1,300 feet below the ice. In a sinister twist, the landscape is so arid that when seals and penguins wander inland and get lost, they never decompose; their remains are left strewn about.
Asbyrgi Canyon, Iceland: Legend has it that the Asbyrgi Canyon in northern Iceland was created when the hoof of a Norse god’s horse touched the earth, slicing through 300-foot-tall cliffs and flattening an area just over two miles long and more than a half mile wide. The likelier scientific explanation is that two periods of glacial flooding carved the canyon between 3,000 and 10,000 years ago. But standing atop the cliffs, with the green carpet of the horseshoe-shaped canyon spread before you, it’s fun to imagine otherwise.
Cano Cristales River, Columbia: Folks make the journey into central Colombia’s Serranéa de la Macarena national park to see why Caño Cristales has inspired nicknames like the River of Five Colors, the Liquid Rainbow, and even the Most Beautiful River in the World. It’s important to get the timing right: when the water reaches the perfect levels (usually between July and December), it becomes a kaleidoscope of pink, green, blue, and yellow as a plant called the Macarenia clavigera, which lives on the river floor, gets the sun it needs to bloom into an explosion of colors.
The Cave of the Crystals, Naica, Mexico: It looks like Superman’s Fortress of Solitude come to life. A thousand feet underground in a working lead and silver mine in Chihuahua, Mexico, opaque crystals of gypsum—some as large as four feet wide and 50 feet long—sprout at all angles from the volcanically heated water below. Temperatures in the cave, which was discovered only in 2000, can reach 150 degrees with nearly 100 percent humidity, conditions that only a superhuman could survive in for long. Any more than 10 minutes in a cave without proper gear can lead to heatstroke.
The Giant's Causeway, Ireland: One of Northern Ireland’s most popular tourist attractions, Giant’s Causeway earned its name from the 40,000 basalt columns that interlock to form what looks like a walkway fit for a colossus. The stones, mostly hexagonal in shape, formed 60 million years ago when underground lava flows cooled into formations as tall as 39 feet high and 18 inches in diameter. It was comparatively recently—about 15,000 years ago—that the soil around the seaside stones eroded and they became visible above ground.
Lake Retba, Senegal: It looks as if someone poured a giant bottle of Pepto-Bismol into Lake Retba—that’s how deeply pink these waters are. The color is actually caused by a particular kind of algae called Dunaliella salina that produces a pigment. The salt content is extremely high, reaching 40 percent in some spots and allowing the algae to thrive (and swimmers to float effortlessly on the surface of the 10-foot-deep lake). Blinding white piles of salt line the shores, and locals work several hours a day harvesting salt from the bright pink water.
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