Mysterious Sights Around the World

I found this cool article on the homepage of MSN.com and thought I'd share it with you guys. It lists some of the most mysterious sights around the world... some of which can be explained and some which cannot.

 "It’s fun to gaze at mysterious sites, wondering how they came about. The harder they are to explain, the more the theories pop up."

Salar de Uyuni, Bolivia

Salar de Uyuni is a magical place: When covered by water, the world’s largest salt flat becomes a mirror, and anyone walking across it appears to be walking on clouds. The salt crust, which covers 4,086 square miles in southwestern Bolivia at 11,995 feet above sea level, is nearly flat, which makes it ideal for calibrating the altimeters of satellites. Salar de Uyuni's origins lie in prehistoric lakes; it is a major breeding ground for several species of flamingoes.

 

 

Racetrack Playa, California

Even NASA cannot explain it. It’s best to gaze in wonder at the sliding rocks on this dry lake bed in Death Valley National Park. Racetrack Playa is almost completely flat, 2.5 miles from north to south and 1.25 miles from east to west, and covered with cracked mud. The rocks, some weighing hundreds of pounds, slide across the sediment, leaving furrows in their wakes, but no one has actually witnessed it. Is it the wind? Something to do with ice? Will it ever be explained?

 

 

Split Apple Rock, New Zealand

Why do so many insist on clambering atop one side or the other of Split Apple Rock, while the less athletically inclined relax at its core? The formation is a big hit with visitors to Abel Tasman National Park on the South Island of New Zealand. It is just one of the highlights in the park, which was founded in 1942, 300 years after Dutch seafarer Abel Tasman became the first European to visit New Zealand. Tourists are lured by golden sandy beaches and rocky outcrops and the likelihood of spotting many birds.

Great Blue Hole, Belize

In 1971, Jacques Cousteau boldly sailed Calypso to the Great Blue Hole, investigated and declared it one of the 10 best diving sites in the world. It’s a large underwater sinkhole near the center of Lighthouse Reef, about 62 miles from Belize City. So much for the mystery. The circular hole is nearly 1,000 feet across and 410 feet deep, boasting underwater caves, fantastic coral formations and many species of tropical fish darting through the clear water.

 

Shilin Stone Forest, China

An old local saying says, “If you have visited Kunming without seeing the Stone Forest, you have wasted your time.” The Shilin Stone Forest covers 96,000 acres with large and small stands of stone “trees.” They actually are karst formations that stand on the earth like stalagmites and looking like petrified trees. Believed to be more than 270 million years old, the stone trees emerged as limestone eroded. Legend says this is the birthplace of Ashima, who was forbidden to marry the man she loved, drowned and turned to stone in the forest. The Torch Festival celebrates her each year.

 

Moaning Cavern, Vallecito, Calif. 

 The sounds echoing through the cavern might be unnervingly like a human moan. But the sound is created by water dripping into holes in the bottom of the formation, which causes a drumming sound that echoes off the walls and is carried out of the Moaning Cavern's natural entrance by the wind. Gold miners came upon this cavern in 1851 (it is near Angels Camp), but it has been known far longer; some of the oldest human remains known in the Americas were found here.

To see all 16 mysterious sights, click here