Anacondas are from the Amazon. Polar bears are from the Arctic. That is just the way of the world, and most of us are comfortable with that. But if our lord and saviour David Attenborough has taught us anything, it is to expect the unexpected from Mother Nature, because she has never once consulted our assumptions before doing whatever she wants.
Snow falls in Kenya. Camels walk in the Outback. And yes, the sun does occasionally shine in Ireland. We have documentation. Eagle-eyed travellers captured some of the most unlikely scenes imaginable and shared them with the world, leaving us utterly confused. These views are proof that no country is quite what you think it is, and that Mother Nature has always had a flair for the dramatic.
#1 Felsengluhen, Altschlossfelsen In Rhineland-Palatine, Germany
Image source: Martin Geisler
#2 Baltic Sea, Nida Beach, Lithuania
The western side of the 98 km long Curonian Spit, facing the Baltic sea, is lined with long white beaches that more often than not have impressively tall sand dunes in the back – some of them 40 to 50 meters high – such as this one near Nida in Neringa, Lithuania.
Image source: Bernt Rostad
#3 Oleshky Sands – “Desert In The Middle Of Europe”, Ukraine
Image source: Tania Adamchuk
Poland is not a country that typically inspires visions of sweeping desert landscapes, and yet tucked away in the Silesian Upland sits the Błędów Desert. A genuine, legitimate, sand-dune-having desert in the middle of central Europe.
Covering around 32 square kilometers, it is the largest concentration of loose sand in Central Europe and has historically been used by the military to train troops for desert combat because it is, apparently, that convincing. Poland gave the world pierogi, Chopin, and Marie Curie. It has also been hiding a desert this whole time, and nobody made nearly enough fuss about it.
#4 Rocchetta Mattei
Basically a fairytale castle near Bologna that looks like it just spawned out of a fantasy novel, with a wild mashup of Moorish, Russian and Gothic (all non-italian) styles all crammed together.
Image source: Angelo nastri nacchio, Aggressive_Owl4802
#5 A Feral Buffalo (Bubalus Bubalis) Soaking At The Bekol Savannah In Baluran National Park, East Java, Indonesia
Image source: Candra Firmansyah
#6 Mount Kenya, Kenya
Image source: Natoesan
Carnival, fanatic football fans, and the Amazon are all on the list of Brazil’s claims to fame. It is less famous for its vast stretches of brilliant white sand dunes, dotted with hundreds of crystal-clear blue lagoons. Parque Nacional dos Lençóis Maranhenses is what happens when you tell AI to generate you a slightly confusing postcard.
You can find it in the northeast of the country, and it is so incredible that it has been awarded UNESCO status. These lagoons fill up during the rainy season, and just as quickly as they appear, they vanish into thin air again. Leaving nothing but wind-swep undulations.
#7 Kolsay Lakes National Park: Almaty Region, Lake Kaindy, Kazakhstan
Image source: Inverseharpy
#8 Gargas, Provence, France
Image source: cometomebrucelee
#9 St Catherine Mountains, Sinai Pensula, Near Sharm El Sheikh, Egypt
Image source: Zoltan Matrahazi
London is many things. It is red buses and grey skies and a population moving at a pace that suggests everyone is always late for something. It is not typically associated with the ornate golden spires and intricate hand-carved stonework of a traditional Hindu temple.
And yet the Shri Swaminarayan Mandir in Neasden is exactly that. It’s a breathtaking monument built entirely from Bulgarian limestone and Italian marble, with not a single piece of steel in its construction. Over a thousand volunteers contributed to its creation. It sits in a North London borough and continues to absolutely floor every single person who stumbles upon it.
#10 Ferny Creek, Victoria, Australia
Image source: Davidarfonjones
#11 Lencois Maranheses, Brazil
Small dunes and a small part of a Pond State Park of sheets Maranhenses, near Barreirinhas, Brazil.
Image source: Micael 106
#12 Pamukkale White Terraces, Turkey
Image source: A.Savin, Wikipedia
If you find yourself erring on the side of confused, it’s called ‘cognitive dissonance‘. The deeply uncomfortable mental sensation of encountering something that refuses to fit the existing filing system. Your brain has a folder for Poland, and it does not contain sand dunes. It has a folder for Argentina, and it does not contain icebergs.
When reality contradicts the label, your brain does not always update gracefully. Usually, it short-circuits slightly, stares for a moment, and then tries to find a way to make the new information someone else’s problem. It is just telling you, “make it make sense!”
#13 Perito Moreno Glacier, Patagonia, Argentina
Image source: Robert Scott Flaum
#14 Sierra Nevada De Santa Marta, Coluombia
Image source: Rolo Andes
#15 Lake Koyashskoye, Yakovenkovo, Leninsky District, Crimea
Image source: Ulgakova Natalia
Snow in Egypt sounds like the setup for a joke without a punchline. And yet it happens. The last significant snowfall in Cairo occurred in 2013, the first in over a century, and the photographs that emerged from it were so surreal they circulated globally with widespread accusations of being edited.
But in the St. Catherine mountains in the Sinai Peninsula, this is not an anomaly! There, you can reliably find around 5 inches of snow each winter. It’s not quite enough to whip out your skis, but it is enough to confuse the hell out of people listening to your travel stories.
#16 Tateyama Kurobe Alpine Route, Japan
Image source: elminium
#17 Swaminarayan Temple, London, United Kingdom
Image source: Sharf Tonse
#18 Dromedary Camel In Outback Australia, Near Silverton, New South Wales
Image source: John O’Neill
When most people picture Roman ruins, they picture Italy. Rome, specifically, with the Colosseum and the Forum dictating the general atmosphere of ancient grandeur in a place where you half expect a toga around the corner. What few people picture is Tunisia, which is an oversight of staggering proportions.
The Amphitheater of El Jem is one of the largest Roman coliseums ever built, rising from the flat Tunisian plains with a scale and level of preservation that rival anything in Rome itself. It seated 35,000 people. It is a UNESCO World Heritage Site. It is in Tunisia, aka AFRICA! The Romans were getting around in ways that the average geography lesson just doesn’t cover.
#19 Pine Island On Derryclare Lough, Connemara, Galway, Ireland
Image source: I_am_person6969
#20 Jasmund National Park, Rugen Island In Mecklenburg-Vorpommern, Germany
Image source: Moahim
#21 Orchards In Snow, Sangla, Himachal Pradesh, India
Image source: UnpetitproleX
About 30 kilometres from Shanghai, there is a town that looks, with alarming accuracy, like a medium-sized English market town. Thames Town in Songjiang district was built in the early 2000s as part of a Chinese urban development initiative and features red telephone boxes, Tudor architecture, cobbled streets, a statue of Winston Churchill, and a replica of a traditional English pub.
It is both one of the most surreal places on earth and one of the most fascinating social experiments in modern urban planning. It is also, reportedly, a very popular spot for wedding photography, which feels like exactly the right energy for a fake English town in China.
#22 Cradle Mountain, Tasmania
Image source: Stefan Karpiniec
#23 Western Brook Pond, Newfoundland Canada
Image source: FreeDoum
#24 Scarborough Bluffs, Bluffer’s Park, Scarborough, Onatrio, Canada
Image source: Benson Kua
If these photos do anything, hopefully they disrupt the very comfortable mental map most of us carry of what the world looks like and where things are supposed to be. The planet has been ignoring our assumptions about it for millions of years and shows absolutely no signs of stopping.
There are deserts where there should be forests, lagoons where there should be dunes, camels where there should be kangaroos. The world is stranger, more surprising, and considerably more interesting than any of us were told. Go see it.
#25 Towers Of Paine, Torres Del Paine National Park, Chile
Image source: Thomas Fuhrmann
#26 Castelluccio (Norcia), A Village In Umbria, In The Apennine Mountains Of Central Italy
Image source: enrico.pighetti
#27 Mauna Kea, Hawaii
Image source: International Gemini Observatory/NOIRLab/NSF/AURA
#28 Rawanduz Canyon As Seen From The Shingelbana Resort, Rawandiz, Iraq
Image source: Hardscarf
#29 Christmas Valley Sand Dunes, Oregon, USA
The Christmas Valley Sand Dunes site near Fort Rock in south-central Oregon is the largest inland shifting sand dune system in the Pacific Northwest – not to mention a popular destination for off-highway vehicle enthusiasts. Composed largely of ash and pumice that blew into the area 7,000 years ago when Mt. Mazama erupted to form Crater Lake, nearly 8,900 acres of the Sand Dunes site is open to vehicle use. Nearby, the Lost Forest Research Natural Area is an unusual stand of ancient ponderosa pine forest – and a remnant of a forest that existed in a cooler and wetter age. Off-highway vehicles (OHVs) are allowed only on designated routes or areas. OHV operators must have a valid driver’s license, state-issued all-terrain vehicle operator permit, or be accompanied by someone 18 or older with these valid documents. A State of Oregon off-highway vehicle sticker is required to operate on all lands managed by the Bureau of Land Management in Oregon. Flags are required on all vehicles on the dunes (9 feet tall orange or red flag).
Image source: BLM Oregon & Washington
#30 Tottori Sand Dune In Tottori Prefecture, Japan
Image source: Hashi photo
#31 Harris Beach, Scotland
Image source: Clément Proust
#32 Colorado Provencal, France
Image source: Jackie McLelland
#33 American Bison, Catalina, Long Beach, Los Angeles
American bison were introduced to Catalina island in 1924 for the filming of a movie and were never removed. Now they’re a popular tourist attraction with a herd size of around 100 individuals.
Image source: Kiloueka
#34 Balcón De Europa In Nerja, Spain
Image source: Tuxyso / Wikimedia Commons / CC BY-SA 3.0
#35 Salinas Grandes, Argentina
Image source: Diego Alejandro Troilo
#36 Helligdomsklipperne, Bornholm, Denmark
Image source: Klugschnacker
#37 La Rumorosa Baja California, Mexico
Image source: Juan O.Mena
#38 Hsi Lai Temple Hacienda Heights, Califoria, USA
Image source: PLawrence99cx
#39 Dobsinska Ice Cave, Dobsina, Slovakia
Image source: dariusz wozniak
#40 Lieberose Desert In The Lieberoser Heide Near Lieberose, Landkreis Dahme-Spreewald, Brandenburg, Germany, It Is Germany’s Largest Desert
Image source: Jan-Herm Janßen
#41 Citadelle Laferrière, Haiti
Image source: SPC Gibran Torres, United States Army
#42 Mount Kosciuszko, Australia
Image source: Martinjohnbudden
#43 Ifrane, Morocco, North Africa
Image source: Vispec
#44 Cerro Aconcagua, Argentina
Image source: Dmitry A. Mottl
#45 A Beach Facing West Towards Papienniemenselkä Of Pyhäjärvi Lake In Papinniemi, Parikkala, South Karelia, Finland
Image source: Simo Räsänen
#46 Laeken (Belgium), Gardens Of The Royal Castle, Brussels, Belgium
Image source: Jean-Pol GRANDMONT
#47 Isle Of Skye, Scotland
Image source: User:Colin / Wikimedia Commons / CC BY-SA 4.0
#48 Amphitheatre Of El Jem, Tunisia
Image source: Agnieszka Wolska
#49 Mount Parnassus, Greece
Image source: EVcollie
#50 Great Sand Dunes National Park, Colorado, USA
Image source: markbyzewski
#51 White Sands National Park, New Mexico, USA
Image source: dconvertini
#52 Trampas Lakes, Pecos Wilderness, New Mexico, USA
A 12 mile hike to an amazing alpine lake sitting at over 11,000 ft elevation at the base of Truchas peak, 2nd highest peak in New Mexico. My wife and dog in the foreground provide some scale.
Image source: johnsow30
#53 Mount Blue Cow At Perisher Blue Ski Resort, Nsw, Australia, As Seen From The Blue Cow Terminal
Image source: User: (WT-shared) Puzzlement at wts wikivoyage
#54 The Pyramid Of Austerlitz, Woudenberg, Netherlands
Image source: Kattjosh
#55 Marion Island, South Africa
Image source: nausea_za
#56 Creel Copper Canyon, Mexico
Image source: CharlieOnTravel
#57 Magnetic Hill, Ladakh, India
Image source: AKS.9955
#58 Thames Town In Songjiang, China
Image source: Huai-Chun Hsu
#59 Wizard Island, Crater Lake, Oregon, USA
Image source: inkknife_2000
#60 Damavand Polour, Iran
Image source: Safa.daneshvar
#61 Rambergstranda, Norway
Image source: Gerd Eichmann
Follow Us
