10 Beautiful Alien-Like Places on Earth
8 replies
Lelsi
2012/03/03 11:23
If you are a nature lover, I'm sure you're gonna like this topic.
Read on and enjoy the stirring pictures of the top ten beautiful alien-like places on earth.
10.Blood Falls, McMurdo, Antarctica
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McMurdo Dry Valleys in Antarctica is one of the most isolated and harshest places in the world. Nothing can survive in this place of subzero temperatures and icy winds, or so it has been thought. Then it's being noticed the blood red liquid draining from Taylor Glacier into Lake Bonney.
Upon closer examination, scientific explorers made one of the most startling discoveries of our time. In a lifeless and alien-like place that is so harsh, nothing can survive is found primordial life. That "blood" that seeps from the wounded glacier is the stuff that life is made of. Somewhere else on our planet, millions of years ago, the very first life form crawled out of this same kind of primordial pool.
What scientists found is startling in that there is a living microbial ecosystem in a place where there is no oxygen. These microbes have devised a way to survive through manipulation of iron and sulfur compounds. While this should be impossible, scientist are considering the possibility of the first known form of life that can carbonize iron. These tiny microbes are "Fixing" the carbon dioxide that iron produces. The term "Fixing" means that they can convert carbon dioxide to organic molecules to be consumed, making them the most efficient CO2 fixers on the planet.
Lelsi
2012/03/03 11:299.Mud Volcanoes of Azerbaijan, Bozdagh, Azerbaijan
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These mini-volcanoes, some as high as 650 feet above the ground, turn the coast of the Caspian Sea into a very dangerous place. A full 300 of the earth's 700 mud volcanoes can be found here, ejecting millions of cubic meters of hydrocarbon gases into the atmosphere.
In 2001, witnesses saw flames eject more than 50 feet and the mud volcano was still belching fire three days later. Despite the danger, people of the region claim that the mud has healing properties prompting health seekers around the world to make the trek to this alien-like place to bath in the mud. To make the off planet experience even more vivid, there is a natural rock formation right in the midst of these volcanic mud monsters that makes music.
8.The Devil's Postpile California, USA
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Mammoth Mountain in Madera County California is the home of Devil Postpile National Monument. Like an alien landscape, this columnar basalt cliff appears out of place from the rest of what used to be part of the Yosemite National Park lands. This strange formation was made by a lava flow that pooled to 400 feet and slowly seeped out. Then, amazingly, a glacier slowly moved through and polished the columns. The strange, alien-like structure was almost destroyed twice. Once during blasting for gold in the 1800s and then when a hydroelectric plant was scheduled to be built there. Walter L. Huber persuaded President Taft to declare the Devil's Postpile a National Monument in 1911 and saved it for us.
Lelsi
2012/03/03 11:337.Pamukkale Water Terraces. Denizli, Turkey
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Hierapolis, Turkey is a renewed ancient city that was built from the ground up to accommodate Romans seeking the healing waters of the Cotton Castle, the name given to this weird and wonderful rock formation and ancient ruins. The Romans used the city and spa as a healing place.
The world almost lost this rare wonder to neglect but fortunately, the cascading pools of white were restored to health by the locals. The water cascades down and forms bright white formations and pools that are only found in a couple of places on our planet, one of which has been destroyed by earthquake. Hot springs rich in calcium form and continue to feed the oyster shaped pools.
6.Lenas Stone Pillars, Siberia
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From the air, Lena's Stone Pillars, also called Lena's stone forest, is so breathtaking as to leave you speechless. It literally looks like the rocks decided that they wanted to be trees and stood up next to the forest by the river. It is a truly amazing sight. The stone forest lines part of the bank of the River Lena, the largest river in Northern Siberia. It is considered to be a vital area for fossils and evidence of early man.
Lelsi
2012/03/03 11:455.Socotra Island, Yemen
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Socotra is located in Muhafazat Hadramawt, Yemen, which actually sounds alien-like, is a very weird and alien looking island. Part of an archipelago or chain of islands, this one makes every effort to impress. One of the reasons it looks so alien is that a full third of its plant life cannot be found anywhere else on the entire planet.
Two oddities make this island standout. First, it is considered the most isolated landform that is not of volcanic origin on earth. The second is that it is an island surrounded by water with a climate that is classified as a desert. It is part of a three island group but the two sister islands are uninhabitable by man. Seagulls thrive on the sisters. It is almost as if three pieces of an alien planet fell from space and landed there off the horn of Africa.
4.Cano Cristales,Colombia
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The explosion of color from the flowering moss that covers the rocks in this one place on earth is so amazing that it has earned this river names like, The Rainbow River, The River that Ran Away from Paradise, The Most Beautiful River in the World, and The River of Five Colors, which is weird because the literally hundreds of shades of each of these five colors is astonishing.
This natural phenomenon of algae does not occur anywhere else in the world in this combination and the conditions are only right for that very brief period of time when the water level is just right and the moss gets the perfect amount of sunlight.
Lelsi
2012/03/03 11:493.Wave Rock,Arizona, USA
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The lines and curves formed from 190 million of years of wind blown sand and rushing water over sandstone turned to rock will make you dizzy and you have to make a real effort not to fall flat on your face. You actually have to play the lottery to get a ticket to see it and only twenty people are allowed to walk on its delicate surface per day.
2.Fly Ranch Geyser,Nevada, USA
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Fly Ranch Geyser looks like a colorful mini-mountain from a space movie because it sits in the middle of a Nevada Ranch.
The owner of the ranch is not interested in tourism and keeps a fence with a locked gate there to keep visitors from gathering. The well was dug 1916 for irrigation purposes but sometime in the 60's, the natural geothermal reservoir found a weak spot and 200 degree water carrying Sulphureus minerals began spewing forth, making the well a man made geyser. Now a little over five feet high and twelve feet across, it appear to be something from another planet.
Lelsi
2012/03/03 11:511.Jellyfish Lake, Eil Malk Island, Republic of Palau
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The Jellyfish explosion that this lake experiences is alien-like and dangerous, not because of the stingers that these killer fish have; they are too small to be felt by humans, it is dangerous because of a layer of poisonous hydrogen sulfide 15 feet below the surface.
Off the coast of Koror in Palau, Jellyfish Lake is one of 70 saltwater lakes that were once connected with the Pacific Ocean. The lake is 12,000 years old and contains a species of Jellyfish named the Golden Jellyfish. For reasons we may not fully understand, the jellyfish migrate across the lake once every single day. There is no scuba diving allowed but snorkelers report that the beauty of this migration is unbelievable.
There is a mystery, however, attached to the jellyfish as they died completely off in the lake in 1998 with a zero population. In 2000, the mysteriously reappeared and science has no explanation.
punamchand
2012/03/03 12:45nice information.thanks frnd
Eternal_Knight
2012/03/03 14:09So freaking fantabulous info sis thanks for share.. I wanna visit them
Shanna
2012/03/10 06:16love the Wave rock & Cano cristales
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