Top 10 Strange Places on Earth That Seem Almost Impossible to Believe
A lake the color of rust. Boulders that slide across a desert and leave tracks behind. A cave sealed off from the sun where a whole ecosystem keeps going anyway. None of it comes from a movie set. You could find every one of these places on a map.
What makes them worth knowing is that the real explanations are often stranger than the legends. Here are ten, counting down.
10. The Door to Hell, Turkmenistan
Out in the Karakum Desert sits a crater roughly 70 meters wide, and it has been burning for decades. The Darvaza Gas Crater is a pit of natural gas on fire, and it glows best after dark.
The popular story says Soviet engineers drilling for gas hit a cavern, the ground collapsed, and they lit the gas to burn it off. Accounts differ on when that happened, and some details are still debated.
9. Lake Natron, Tanzania
Lake Natron looks like someone tipped rust into a salt flat. Its red and orange tints come partly from salt-loving microbes, and its water is so alkaline it can irritate skin.
Even so, lesser flamingos breed here in huge numbers. The harsh water keeps most predators away. You may have seen photos of "stone" birds online. The lake doesn't turn animals to stone on contact, but minerals can coat the bodies of animals that die there.
For decades, rocks on Racetrack Playa left long trails across the dry lakebed, and nobody had seen them move. Theories ranged from wind to aliens.
In 2013, researchers finally caught it happening using GPS trackers and cameras. When a thin pond freezes overnight, the ice breaks into floating panels. A light wind then pushes the panels, and the panels nudge the rocks along. It takes just the right mix of conditions, which is why it's so rarely seen.
7. Socotra Island, Yemen
Socotra sits in the Indian Ocean off the Horn of Africa, and it looks like another planet. The dragon's blood trees have umbrella-shaped crowns and red resin, which gives them their name.
Because the island has been isolated for so long, much of its life evolved nowhere else. According to UNESCO, about 37 percent of its plant species grow only there.
6. The Giant's Causeway, Northern Ireland
About 40,000 stone columns line this coast, packed together so tightly they look built. Irish legend says the giant Finn McCool made them as a path to Scotland.
The real story is volcanic. Around 50 to 60 million years ago, lava cooled and cracked into these columns. It's a UNESCO World Heritage Site, and the legend is still part of the tour.
5. The Paris Catacombs, France
Under the busy streets of Paris lie tunnels holding the bones of an estimated six million people. In the late 1700s, the city's cemeteries were overflowing and causing health problems, so the remains were moved into old limestone quarries.
Only a small section is open to visitors today. The skulls and bones are stacked in neat patterns, which makes it more unsettling than you'd expect.
4. Blood Falls, Antarctica
Against all that white ice, a stream of red flows out of Taylor Glacier in the McMurdo Dry Valleys. It looks like the glacier is bleeding.
The water is very salty and rich in iron, trapped beneath the ice. When it reaches the air, the iron rusts, and the red appears. Scientists studying the brine have found microbes living in it, in a place with no light.
3. Eternal Flame Falls, USA
In Chestnut Ridge Park in western New York, a small waterfall hides a small fire. Natural gas seeps out of the rock in a little grotto at the base of the falls and feeds a flame.
The name is generous. Wind or splashing water can put it out, and visitors sometimes relight it. When it's burning, fire and water sit just inches apart.
2. Movile Cave, Romania
Workers found Movile Cave in 1986, and scientists were stunned by what lived inside. The cave had been cut off from the surface for a very long time, and its air is low in oxygen and high in carbon dioxide and methane.
Instead of sunlight, the food chain starts with bacteria that get energy from chemicals like hydrogen sulfide. Many of the animals living there are found nowhere else. Access is limited to researchers, so this is one you can only read about.
1. Zhangye Danxia, China
In Gansu Province, hills are striped in red, orange, yellow, and green, like layers of paint. Different minerals, especially iron compounds, are the main reason for the colors.
The layers of sandstone and other rock built up over millions of years. Then tectonic forces tilted and lifted them, and wind and rain carved them into the ridges you see today.
Final thoughts
Some of these places inspired myths, and some baffled scientists for years. What I find best is that learning the real explanation doesn't spoil the mystery. It usually makes the place cooler.
Which one of these would you most want to visit? Tell us in the comment section.
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