Inspiring Places
Out of this World
The world is stuffed full of run-of-the-mill beautiful scenery. But from windswept lunar landscapes, jagged peaks and shimmering salt flats, this article features a series of the strangest landscapes from across the globe.
We’ve picked out an assortment of some well-known – and some not so well-known – of the world's more unusual natural wonders. Some of the landscapes featured below could be described as ‘alien’ in their sheer otherworldly weirdness; one way or another, though, all of them are downright cool!
Vatnajokull & Grimsvotn Volcano, Iceland
Vatnajokull is by far and away Europe’s biggest glacier. In fact, covering a vast surface area of 8,100 square kilometers, it’s bigger than all the others put together! Like most glaciers, the combination of its sheer scale and the chilly silence that hangs over it, is simply awe-inspiring.
In something of a ‘two weird and wonderful landscapes for the price of one’ deal, the area is also the site of the Grimsvotn Volcano. And this is what makes it so genuinely special: the volcano is underneath the ice and its occasional violent eruptions cause huge plumes of steam to rise miles into the sky.
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Auyan Tepui, Venezuela
Auyan Tepui is one of several jutting promontories of rock that loom over the Guiana Highlands like slumbering dinosaurs. Indeed, there’s a wonderfully prehistoric, ‘Lost World’ feel about it that grips you long before you actually get set eyes on the place.
The story of how the mighty Angel Falls were ‘discovered’ is a case in point: a gold-prospector called Jimmy Angel crash-landed on the top of the mesa, only to have to spend two weeks struggling through the 700 square km of primordial jungle, and scaling the almost sheer cliffs, to get back to civilization.
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Badlands, USA
The United States are home to more weird and wonderful landscapes than almost anywhere else in the world. (Utah alone is home to Bryce Canyon, to weird hoodoos like ‘Thor’s Hammer’, countless natural bridges and arches, the Great Salt Lake and the Mittens of Monument Canyon…)
But, up to the north, the South Dakota Badlands are equally as dramatic. A series of scarcely credible rock formations dot a landscape that’s on the haunted side of bare. And let’s face it, there’s just something slightly thrilling about that name!
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The Salt Plains of Salar de Uyuni, Bolivia
In recent years, the Uyuni Salt plains have been threatened by the ever greater number of visitors who travel to them. But you can hardly blame people for wanting to get a glimpse of the incredible spectacle of the world’s largest salt plains.
The salt plains are at their most beautiful when waterlogged on a clear day. Then, reflecting the brilliant blue sky above, and stretching off towards the horizon in every direction, they become the most breathtaking natural mirror imaginable.
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The Skeleton Coast, Namibia
Being bordered on one side by the immensity of the Atlantic, and on the other by the harshness of the Namib Desert makes the Skeleton Coast one of the most desolate – and starkly beautiful – stretches of coastline on the planet.
As the searing heat of the desert meets the cool of the ocean, a thick fog is created. Seeing the rusting hulks of grounded ships and the many long-stripped skeletons coming out of the mist at you as you walk along the shore is a truly eerie experience.
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Sundarbans Mangrove Swamps, Bangladesh
Mangrove swamps are undeniably atmospheric places – but few can outdo the vast expanses of mangroves at Sundarbans in Bangladesh. As your boat winds ever deeper into the muddy channels, past the twisted roots and tendrils, you begin to wonder if you’ll ever get out…
In the evening, as the sun dips into the sweltering undergrowth, the weird cries of the wildlife ringing out in the gathering gloom add to the drama of the scene.
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The White Desert – Al Wadi Al Jadid, Egypt
Sitting on the far northern extremes of Egypt’s Western Desert, and covering an area about twelve times the size of the United Kingdom, is Egypt’s White Desert: Al Wadi al Jadid. Made up of a stark mixture of shifting sands, rolling dunes and huge rock formations, worn away by thousands of years of hot desert winds, it’s a remarkable spectacle.
The area’s high mineral content (pyrites are particularly common) means that the landscape sparkles and gleams in the piercing sun. Watching the rocks flicker in the last rays of sunlight is especially dazzling.
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