The high­est tem­per­a­ture on the plan­et is +70.7 C, tak­ing away the record from the North Amer­i­can Death Val­ley. For mil­lions of years, the hot wind has bit­ten into the rock, cre­at­ing bizarre alien land­scapes. In the Lut desert there are dunes famil­iar to every­one, but saline for­ma­tions are much more inter­est­ing. Sharp rocks, a val­ley with kilo­me­ters of frozen waves, sharp as blades on th […]

Shushtar was built as a for­ti­fied city on the Roy­al Road, which con­nect­ed the two Per­sian cap­i­tals — Susa and Perse­po­lis. In the 600s BC, a com­plex irri­ga­tion sys­tem began to be cre­at­ed around the fortress. Sev­er­al com­plex struc­tures raise the water lev­el in Karuna for sev­er­al kilo­me­ters to irri­gate sug­ar­cane plan­ta­tions in the vicin­i­ty of the city. Dur­ing the reign of the Sis­sanid dyna […]

The mosque is locat­ed on Naqsh‑e Jahan Square (Imam Square) and is the largest mosque in the city. Actu­al­ly, when we talk about Isfa­han, the first thing that comes to mind is the appear­ance of Naqsh‑e Jahan Square with a large gold­en dome of the Lut­ful­la mosque. This is the clear­est exam­ple of Per­sian archi­tec­ture and the Isfa­han school — an abun­dance of pierc­ing blue mosaics, incred­i­bl […]

The Shah-Cher­akh Mosque is a mau­soleum in which the graves of Ahmed and Mohammed, the sons of Mus­sa al-Kadim and the broth­ers of Imam Reza, are locat­ed. In fact, they are direct descen­dants of the Prophet. There­fore, it is a very spir­i­tu­al and reli­gious place with an end­less num­ber of pil­grims from all over the world.

For­mer com­mer­cial cap­i­tal of Per­sia. Ancient Islam­ic archi­tec­ture, sev­er­al UNESCO World Her­itage Sites at once, stun­ning arched bridges over the Zayande Rud Riv­er.

In fact, Gonbad-e-Qabus is an impres­sive tow­er-tomb, a stun­ning mon­u­ment in hon­or of the famous prince, poet, sci­en­tist, gen­er­al and patron of the arts, Qabus. He ruled in this region at the turn of the 11th cen­tu­ry, and decid­ed to build a mon­u­ment in order to remain for cen­turies. The tow­er, 55 meters tall, was com­plet­ed in 1006, six years before Gabus was killed by an assas­sin.

The prop­er­ty includes nine gar­dens in as many provinces. They exem­pli­fy the diver­si­ty of Per­sian gar­den designs that evolved and adapt­ed to dif­fer­ent cli­mate con­di­tions while retain­ing prin­ci­ples that have their roots in the times of Cyrus the Great, 6th cen­tu­ry BC. Always divid­ed into four sec­tors, with water play­ing an impor­tant role for both irri­ga­tion and orna­men­ta­tion, the Per­sian […]

The full name of the reserve, unique in its bio­log­i­cal diver­si­ty, is “Gola Rain­for­est”. Its trop­i­cal mas­sifs are rich in var­i­ous rep­re­sen­ta­tives of flo­ra and fau­na. There are more than 600 species of but­ter­flies alone. There are about 900 species of plants, includ­ing 230 vari­eties of trees. There are many birds here — there are about 300 species, includ­ing 14 rare ones. Favor­able con­dit […]

ith arms out­stretched 28 meters, as if to encom­pass all of human­i­ty, the colos­sal Art Deco stat­ue of Christ, called Cristo Reden­tor (Christ the Redeemer), gazes out over Rio de Janeiro and the bay from the sum­mit of Cor­co­v­a­do. The 709-meter height on which it stands is part of the Tiju­ca Nation­al Park, and a rack rail­way climbs 3.5 kilo­me­ters to its top, where a broad plaza sur­rounds t […]

This is tru­ly a grandiose palace com­plex. And it is also the largest and largest res­i­dence of the cur­rent ruler. The area of the palace premis­es is more than 200 thou­sand m2. On the palace ter­ri­to­ry: 1788 dif­fer­ent rooms; 257 bath­rooms; 18 ele­va­tors; 5 pools; park­ing for 5000 cars. You can vis­it inside the Sul­tan’s Palace only 3 days a year.

Found­ed by King Mwezi IV Gis­abo after vic­to­ry over a rebel­lious chief, the site became a cen­ter for pre­serv­ing rit­u­al drum­ming. Tech­niques are passed down through gen­er­a­tions, and per­for­mances com­bine music, dance, and poet­ry.

Sim­tokha Dzong trans­lates to Tem­ple Fortress and it’s every bit colos­sal and allur­ing. Built in the year 1629, the tem­ple has now been con­vert­ed to a muse­um that lures a huge num­ber of vis­i­tors every year and is among the most pop­u­lar Bhutan tourist spots. If you are a lover of lin­guis­tics and wish to learn the local lan­guage of Dzongkha, then you can learn the lan­guage here. Do not mis […]

Punakha Dzong is arguably the most beau­ti­ful dzong in the coun­try, espe­cial­ly in spring when the lilac-coloured jacaran­da trees bring a lush sen­su­al­i­ty to the dzong’s char­ac­ter­is­ti­cal­ly tow­er­ing white­washed walls. This dzong was the sec­ond to be built in Bhutan and it served as the cap­i­tal and seat of gov­ern­ment until the mid-1950s. All of Bhutan’s kings have been crowned here. The dzon […]

The Tak­t­sang Pal­phug Monastery, also known as Paro Tak­t­sang and the Tiger’s Nest, is pre­cip­i­tous­ly tucked away in the moun­tains. It is perched on a cliff at an ele­va­tion of over 10,000 feet, over­look­ing the Paro val­ley in Bhutan, the small Himalayan coun­try nes­tled between India and Chi­na. With white build­ings and red and gold roofs, the monastery is an exquis­ite jew­el hid­den among the […]

The Bud­dha Dor­den­ma Stat­ue is a 169 feet tall stat­ue of Bud­dha, built at the foot of the hills in Thim­phu. This icon­ic gold and bronze stat­ue is vis­i­ble from almost any­where in Thim­phu and is among the best tourist places in Bhutan.

After Christo­pher Columbus‘s arrival on the island in 1492, San­to Domin­go became the site of the first cathe­dral, hos­pi­tal, cus­toms house and uni­ver­si­ty in the Amer­i­c­as. This colo­nial town, found­ed in 1498, was laid out on a grid pat­tern that became the mod­el for almost all town plan­ners in the New World.

Two kilo­me­tres long, being divid­ed into two areas: a pub­lic area and a pri­vate one. The pub­lic area of the beach is vis­it­ed main­ly by locals dur­ing the week­ends and hol­i­days. This beach is very suit­able for a fun fam­i­ly beach day, since its waters are very calm, in addi­tion to being shal­low, which makes them ide­al for enjoy­ing the water with kids.