For every wonder or oddity you can see in a high quality science fiction movie, Mother Nature has spent centuries and millennia slowly carving out an equally stunning work of art on her expansive natural canvas. Across the globe, the natural world is studded with landscapes that seem to leap right from the mind of Spielberg or Nolan. Instead, they are the tireless work of erosion, wind, earthquakes, and rainfall, the implements on Nature’s palette. Here, for your consideration, are some the Earth’s weirdest and most awe-inspiring natural wonders, carved by the planet herself.
1. The Marble Caves Are Located on a Peninsula of Solid Marble That Spans the Chile-Argentina Border
2. New Zealand’s Champagne Pool May Look Gorgeous, But the 900-Year-Old Hot Spring’s Bubbles are Composed of Pure Carbon Dioxide
3. Located in a Remote Section of the Ural Mountains in Russia are the Manpapuner Rock Formations, 200-Foot-Tall Stone Pillars that Were Formed From the Ice and Wind
4. Nicknamed the Eye of the Sahara, this Circular Formation Is 30 Miles Wide and Visible From Space; It’s So Distinct that Shuttle Crews Use it As a Landmark
5. Hey, Did You Know Mud Volcanoes Were a Thing? Though They’re Scattered Around the World, Nearly Half of Them Are Located in Azerbaijan and the Caspian Sea
6. Devil’s Tower in Wyoming Is So Mysterious That It’s the Focal Point of ‘Close Encounters of the Third Kind,’ One of the Most Seminal Sci-Fi Films Ever Made
7. Located on the Coast of Oregon, Thor’s Well May Not Be an Entrance to the Devil’s Domain (The Jury is Still Out), But It’s Certainly Treacherous; Jagged Rocks and 20 Foot Waves Surround the Chasm
8. The Moreaki Boulders Are Scattered Along the Beach of New Zealand; These Calcite Formations Supposedly Formed More than 65 Million Years Ago
9. Aptly Called the ‘Gateway to Hell,’ the Danakil Depression in Ethiopia Comes Complete With a Living Lake of Lava, Geysers of Steaming Liquid, Acid Ponds, and Long Stretches of Just Sulfur
10. No, This Isn’t B-Roll of the Fortress of Solitude, It’s Mexico’s Cave of Crystals Which Contains Some Gypsum Crystals That Can Weigh in Excess of 120,000 Pounds
11. New Mexico Is Home to Large Expanses of Harshly Eroded Wilderness of Strange Rock Formations
12. No One Knows Exactly How Approximately 400 Pine Trees in Poland Each Grew With Mysteriously Bent Trunks
13. Italy’s Elephant Rock Is Extra Odd Because It Was Once Part Of a Famous Complex of Oddly Shaped Rocks Until it Rolled Away, Coming to Rest in Its Present Position
14. Aptly Named the Great Blue Hole in Belize Is More than 400 Feet Deep and 980 Feet Wide; the Submerged Vertical Cave Is Considered to Be the Largest of It’s Kind
15. Another ‘Door to Hell’ Is Located in Turkmenistan, Though It’s Received a Little Help From Idiots Who Lit a Natural Gas Fire That’s Been Burning Continuously Since 1971
16. One of New Zealand’s Most Popular Tourist Spots, Split Apple Rock Is a Natural Geological Formation Made Entirely of Granite; There’s Even a Cleft in the Top
17. The Giant’s Causeway Consists of More than 40,000 Basalt Columns The Are the Result of a Volcano Eruption that Took Place Millions of Years Ago
18. Madera County, California’s Devil’s Postpile is a Natural Arrangement of Towering Basalt Columns, Some of Which are as High as 60 Feet
19. Namibia’s Dead Marsh is Home to a Forest of 900-Year-Old Trees That Have Been Perfectly Preserved Over a Millennium Thanks to the Hot, Dry Conditions
20. Antelope Canyon is the Most Photographed Canyon in the American Southwest, With Good Reson
21. In the Northwest Corner of the Indian Ocean Are the Dragon’s Blood Trees, Which Reign Over an Archipelago Filled with Unique Plants and Animals
22. The Spotted Lake in Canada Is So Shallow That Most of Its Water Evaporates Over the Summer, Leaving Only the Marks of the Minerals That Lie in the Water
23. Take a Good Map Before You Head into Russia’s Valley of the Geysers, Which is Home to More than 20 Big Geysers, Some of Which Erupt Every Ten Minutes
24. If You Want to Visit the Gorgeous Limestone Hornocal Mountains, You’re Going to Need to Be Prepared to Walk it as the Road in Is Too Treacherous for Motor Vehicles
25. In Panjin, China, There’s a Lake Called Red Beach in Which a Unique Type of Seaweed Turns the Water a Crimson Red Every Fall, Much to the Delight of the Local Wildlife (and the Tourists)
26. This Isn’t a Petrified Forest (or a Digital Painting), It’s Scotlands Fingal’s Cave, Which is Located on the Uninhabited Island of Staffa
