© J Marshall – Tribaleye Images / AlamySalar de Uyuni, Bolivia
Salar de Uyuni, the larger of the two Bolivian salt flats, contains an astounding 10 billion tons of salt and covers over 4,000 square miles. That makes it the largest salt flat in the world, more than 20 times bigger than America’s largest, in Death Valley. —Ken Jennings
Lake Retba (Lac Rose), Senegal
Just under an hour from Dakar, the capital city of Senegal, sits this naturally pink lake. Lake Retba, or Lac Rose, gets its distinctive color from a bacteria that produces a red pigment in order to absorb the sunlight. —Laura Ratliff
Mint Images – Frans LantingAntelope Canyon, Arizona
Antelope Canyon is a stunning slot canyon in the American Southwest. Its Navajo name, “the place where water runs through rocks,” is an allusion to the canyon’s creation through erosion. The narrow, undulating spaces between rock formations allow for vivid patterns when sunlight filters through the striated stone. —Hadley Keller
© TAO Images Limited / AlamyZhangjiajie National Forest Park, China
Zhangjiajie National Forest Park was the first authorized national forest park in China. Do the towering pillar-like mountains of this national forest look familiar? This park was used as a prototype for the landscape in James Cameron’s Avatar. The Chinese government was so taken with this cameo that they renamed the “Southern Sky Column” of Zhangjiajie “Avatar Hallelujah Mountain” in 2010. —Hadley Keller
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Walking On Water, Canada
In the far northern reaches of Canada—the wild, frozen territory of Nunavut—you can walk on water. A mile out to sea on Canada’s Baffin Bay, you risk some slippery footing, but you can clamber up a half-pipe inside this massive berg. Walk along a curving ice-valley for a hundred feet or so, come out on the other side, and slide back down onto the sea ice. —Anthony Doerr
Courtesy Red Sea Star BarRed Sea Star Bar, Israel
Anchored 16 feet below The Red Sea, this underwater lounge might make you rethink the phrase “dive bar.” Eccentric decor—jellyfish-shaped chairs and sea cucumber–inspired pillars—certainly evoke the briny surroundings, but nothing is quite as evocative as what’s beyond the bar. Gaze out one of the 62 windows to see gray moray eels, turtles, and other marine life. —Sarah Bruning
Ben NilssonIcebar, Sweden
The IceHotel and bar in the village of Jukkasjärvi is reconstructed annually, with input by artists from around the world; it features snow floors, carved-ice furniture, and barware. Don your warmest gear (and close-toed shoes) if you plan to sip a cocktail in this frigid lounge, reputed to be the original subzero drinking destination. —Sarah Bruning
Keven R. Morris/CorbisMorning Glory Pool, Wyoming
Morning Glory Pool sits at the north end of Upper Geyser Basin, home to Old Faithful, in Yellowstone National Park. Unfortunately, due to years of tourists dropping coins into the pool, it’s no longer as blue as it used to be, but it still does retain some of its brilliant hue. —CNTraveler.com
Getty ImagesSummit on Mauna Kea, Hawaii
The 13,800-foot climb from Hilo’s beaches to the moonscape at the summit of Mauna Kea isn’t for the faint of heart. It marks (to our knowledge, at least) the single longest sustained climb on Earth. —Peter Koch
© HOW HWEE YOUNG/epa/CorbisHappy Magic, China
Officially known as the Beijing Water Cube Water Park, Happy Magic is part of the National Aquatics Center and is now Beijing’s most visited tourist spot after the Great Wall. Thanks to a major renovation in 2011, the place looks even more futuristic than on opening day in 2008: Think splashy colored tubes, transporting human water rockets through a system of slides twisting this way and that. —Lauren Viera
Doug Perrine/Nature Picture Library/CorbisBioluminescent Dinos, The Maldives
Several islands of the Maldives, including Rangali and Vaadhoo, offer excursions on the Indian Ocean you simply cannot miss. The dark water is illuminated by thousands of bioluminescent creatures referred to as pyrodinium bahamense, which are dinoflagellates or dinos. When disturbed—for example, by a wave breaking on the beach—they emit a dramatic, blue light. —Alexandra Esposito
Courtesy 727 FuselageAn Airplane Hotel, Costa Rica
Hotel Costa Verde is located on a coastal rainforest bluff overlooking the Pacific beaches of Manuel Antonio National Park. The hotel is a shell of an old 1965 Boeing 727, transported to the jungle to make it look like it “landed” among the treetops. The result is part hotel suite, part treehouse. —Marisa LaScala
A Temple Unearthed in Java, Indonesia
An hour’s drive from Yogyakarta, Borobudur sat relatively undisturbed for a millennium, until 1814, when Sir Stamford Raffles, the British lieutenant governor of Java, heard rumors of an ancient temple buried beneath volcanic ash and overgrown jungle. Now the ninth-century Mahayana Buddhist Temple, declared a UNESCO World Heritage Site, is open to the public. —Deborah Dunn and Ken Kochey
gmsphotographyFingal’s Cave, Scotland
Reminiscent of Giant’s Causeway in Northern Ireland, and just across the sea in Scotland’s Inner Hebrides, Fingal’s Cave on the island of Staffa boasts the same hexagonal basalt columns, but houses them in a cathedral-like sea cave with shimmering turquoise water. —Jonathan Shannon
The Wave, Arizona
This awe-inspiring rock wave in shades of ochre and crimson unfolds through the Paria Canyon–Vermilion Cliffs Wilderness on the border of Utah and Arizona. First water, then wind eroded the Navajo sandstone, revealing layers of sand that blew through the area during the Jurassic period. Access to “the wave” is heavily restricted; the Bureau of Land Management hands out only 20 permits to the Coyote Buttes region a day. —Jonathan Shannon
Source: cntraveler.com
