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Jul 13, 2019Batten down the hatches

The athletes on these boats are jockeying for position at the start of the Chicago Yacht Club Race to Mackinac Island (pronounced ‘Mack-i-naw’). The ‘Mac,’ at 333 miles long, is the world’s oldest and longest annual freshwater boat race. It’s an amateur event, but make no mistake, these sailors know their stuff. Many go on to race in the America’s Cup. This year’s race is held this weekend. The boats set sail—smallest to largest—just off Chicago’s Navy Pier, passing by the city skyline as we see in our image. When crews pass under the span of the mighty Mackinac Bridge—connecting the Lower Peninsula to the Upper Peninsula—Lake Michigan becomes Lake Huron, and the island appears.Desktop Version

Jul 14, 2019Nesting season for the leatherbacks

This time of year is nesting season for leatherback sea turtles in the Atlantic. After mating at sea, these big mamas—leatherbacks are the largest of all turtles—haul themselves up onto beaches in the same region where they were born. The turtles dig out nests in the sand and lay a clutch of about 80 fertilized eggs the size of billiard balls. They"ll repeat this ritual a few more times before returning to their migratory lives in the open ocean. About 65 days later, turtle hatchlings will start to poke up through the sand and make a dash toward the safety of the sea. But the odds are against them: Only 1 percent of the hatchlings will live to reach sexual maturity, at around 16 years old.Desktop Version

Jul 15, 2019Marine Day in Japan

In Japan, the third Monday in July is Marine Day (also known as Ocean Day), a day to show appreciation for the seas and oceans. Other nationalities have similar observances, but as inhabitants of an island nation, people in Japan can claim a particularly strong connection to the waters that surround them. The modern holiday also serves as an official start of summer in Japan, and many folks hit the beach to celebrate the end of tsuyu, the rainy season. The holiday started as Marine Memorial Day in 1941 to mark the anniversary of the return of the Meji Emperor from a voyage in 1876, but it wasn"t observed as a national holiday until 1996. Some also mark Marine Day with environmentally friendly activities. In Okinawa, people throw EM (effective microorganism) mudballs into the sea—these contain bacteria and yeast targeted at eliminating sludge and slime. Other areas host beach cleanups and aquariums host special Marine Day events.Desktop Version

Jul 16, 2019Hemingway’s Keys

We’re in Key West, Florida, for Hemingway Days, the annual celebration of beloved local hero and author, Ernest Hemingway. The Nobel Prize winner was also an adventurer and outdoorsman who enjoyed fishing and drinking here—in addition to working on several books including ‘To Have and Have Not,’ which takes place in the coastal town. And no trip to Key West today is complete without visiting the Spanish Colonial that he called home. Built in 1851, Hemingway lived here in the 1930s. Though the house was in disrepair when he and his second wife, Pauline, took ownership, the two restored the home and even installed a swimming pool—at the time the only in-ground pool in 100 miles. The house is now a National Historic Landmark and museum.Desktop Version

Jul 17, 2019Nomads of the Gobi

The Gobi Desert stretches across 500,000 square miles, covering parts of northern China and southern Mongolia. Due to the Gobi’s high elevation and high latitude, it’s a cold desert. And while we tend to think of deserts as endless sand dunes, most of the Gobi’s topography is exposed rock.Desktop Version

Jul 18, 2019A learning garden

Today we’re at Waterperry Gardens in Oxfordshire, England. The gardens have gone through many changes since 1931, when Beatrix Havergal and Avice Sanders first began turning the grounds of a country house into an educational public garden. (Waterperry grew much-needed produce during World War II.) The gardening school at Waterperry closed in 1971, and now the land is owned and operated by the School of Economic Science, which uses some of the buildings for study projects and retreats. Waterperry is a wonderful example of classic English gardening. Visitors can stroll through the aromatic knot garden seen on our homepage today, or explore other parts of the gardens, including orchards, a nursery, and a museum.Desktop Version

Jul 19, 2019A place fit for the gods

Perhaps it was inevitable that this park on the western edge of Colorado Springs was named Garden of the Gods. One of the surveyors who established the city was so struck by the beauty of the rock formations here that he thought it a suitable setting for the gods to assemble, and so lent the spot its name. But the native Ute people also have divine associations with the area, which their creation myth names as the place where all life began. Today, it’s a popular public park and National Natural Landmark. Because it’s within the city limits, locals and visitors alike can get a heaping dose of nature without having to travel far from civilization. If you stroll by any of the rock formations here, you’re likely to see a climber or two scaling the red and pink sandstone walls—or ‘fins’—that give the park its distinct look.Desktop Version

Jul 20, 2019Bringing the moon to Earth

It was 50 years ago that Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin became the first humans to feel an alien gravity tugging at them. By landing on the moon on July 20, 1969, a mere 66 years after the first powered flight by the Wright brothers, the two astronauts met the challenge set by John F. Kennedy seven years earlier to land men on the moon before the end of the decade.Desktop Version

Jul 21, 2019A peek behind the royal curtain

In today"s image, we"re featuring a view of the East Front of Buckingham Palace and the Victoria Memorial to highlight a seasonal event and a historic one. On Friday Buckingham Palace began its official summer tourist season, offering visitors a chance to tour the magnificent state rooms used for official and ceremonial events in this working royal residence. This year, to mark the 200th anniversary of Queen Victoria"s birth, visitors can also see artifacts from her reign and artwork depicting her life at Buckingham Palace in a special collection called Queen Victoria"s Palace.Desktop Version

Jul 22, 2019Let’s go mothing

In the Lepidoptera order of the animal kingdom, it’s butterflies who get all the glory. But we’d argue it’s their relatives, moths, that have the better story. With more than 160,000 species of moths around the world, moths outnumber butterfly species roughly 10 to 1. While most are nocturnal, the hummingbird hawk-moth on our homepage today breaks the mold. Found throughout Africa, Asia, and Europe, it’s shown here in the daylight of southern Sardinia, sipping nectar with its straw-like appendage known as a proboscis. Like a hummingbird, the moth makes a soft buzzing sound as it hovers over the flowers whose nectar it feeds on exclusively.Desktop Version

Jul 23, 2019A state-of-the-art lookout on the Rock of Gibraltar

Make your way up the trails of this monolithic rock promontory to the Skywalk, an 8,000-square-foot glass platform that soars more than 1,100 feet above sea level. On a clear day, you can see three countries and two continents from here. These epic views draw tourists, as does the Rock’s legendary history. A British Overseas Territory since 1713, Gibraltar has long been a strategically important military outpost located near the southern tip of Europe on the Iberian Peninsula. Far below the Skywalk, visitors can take in military relics that date back to the first years of British rule here.Desktop Version

Jul 24, 2019Can you see the family resemblance?

Honestly, we"re not sure who decided that July 24 was Cousins Day, but we"re all for it—and these meerkats look like they are too. A clan (also called a mob, gang, or manor) usually contains about 20 or 30 meerkats, but some extended families have 50 or more. Females can detect the odor of their kin and use it to avoid inbreeding. They’re native to southern Africa, including the Kalahari Desert in Botswana, which is where this clan was photographed.Desktop Version

Jul 25, 2019Jane’s Carousel delights

National Merry-Go-Round Day brings us to the Brooklyn waterfront, home of Jane’s Carousel, a merry-go-round that’s been delighting riders for nearly a century. Its story starts in 1922, an era of speakeasies and flappers and a booming time in carousel history, when the rides were a symbol of a community’s prosperity. Jane’s Carousel was built in Idora Park in Youngstown, Ohio, a steel city.Desktop Version

Jul 26, 2019The party’s just starting

To usher in the summer music festival season, we take you to a pastoral hillside in the Swiss Alps for the International Alphorn Festival held each summer near the town of Nendaz. Musicians are gathering here this weekend to celebrate and blow these enormous traditional horns of the Alps. No one really knows the origin of the alphorn. We do know that for centuries, European mountain folks from the Alps and east to the Carpathian Mountains used this horn to signal to each other across great distances and to call in animal herds. Even though the horn has no valves or keyholes, it’s not easy to play and requires great lung power.Desktop Version

Jul 27, 2019Longer days mean warmer sand

Today we’re hitting the beach in Costa Rica’s Cahuita National Park because, well, just take a look at this place. If the sun gets too intense, we might take a stroll into the park’s lowland wet forest where, if we’re lucky, we’ll see sloths, toucans, and howler and capuchin monkeys; or maybe we’ll encounter armadillos, coatis, iguanas, and tamanduas (anteaters). After that, we’ll take a dip in the Caribbean waters offshore to marvel at coral reefs, sea turtles, and hundreds of species of fish.Desktop Version

Jul 28, 2019Road-trip worthy attraction in the heartland

Today we’re visiting Carhenge, a popular roadside attraction in western Nebraska. Carhenge is the passion project of Jim Reinders, who came up with the idea to memorialize his father. Like Stonehenge, Carhenge is a glimpse of culture now past—the heyday of the American automobile. While living in England, Reinders studied Stonehenge"s structure, which allowed him to replicate the formation using 39 vehicles, including cars, trucks, and even one Jeep. Reinders and about 35 family members built the attraction in June 1987. And with another nod to Stonehenge, they dedicated it on the summer solstice that same month. Since then, more than 60,000 people have visited the attraction and it’s appeared in music videos, TV shows, commercials, and even on an album cover.Desktop Version

Jul 28, 2019Road-trip worthy attraction in the heartland

Today we’re visiting Carhenge, a popular roadside attraction in western Nebraska. Carhenge is the passion project of Jim Reinders, who came up with the idea to memorialize his father. Like Stonehenge, Carhenge is a glimpse of culture now past—the heyday of the American automobile. While living in England, Reinders studied Stonehenge"s structure, which allowed him to replicate the formation using 39 vehicles, including cars, trucks, and even one Jeep. Reinders and about 35 family members built the attraction in June 1987. And with another nod to Stonehenge, they dedicated it on the summer solstice that same month. Since then, more than 60,000 people have visited the attraction and it’s appeared in music videos, TV shows, commercials, and even on an album cover.Desktop Version

Jul 29, 2019A picture-perfect day on Trillium

Today we"re out on Trillium Lake, a manmade lake in the shadow of Mount Hood, Oregon"s tallest peak. Formed in 1960 by damming a tributary of the Salmon River, Trillium Lake"s a popular spot for fishing, camping, and boating. In springtime, the surrounding woods are filled with trilliums, the native flowering plants the lake"s named for. Take the flat, 1.9-mile loop trail around the lakeshore for stunning views of Mount Hood. But don"t stop there. Mount Hood National Forest has more than 1,200 miles of hiking trails, not to mention year-round skiing at higher elevations. Wrap up your day at the Timberline Lodge, built during the Great Depression by the WPA and now a National Historic Landmark. Bonus fact: Timberline Lodge was used for exterior shots of the Overlook Hotel in the horror movie "The Shining." But don"t let that scare you off visiting.Desktop Version

Jul 30, 2019A long, erratic commute

Don’t set your watch to the migration timetable of the Galápagos giant tortoise—it doesn’t follow a predictable schedule the way so many other animal migrations do. Scientists first tracked the migration of giant tortoises in the Galápagos Islands in 2013, and they’ve discovered that not only is it marvelously slow, it’s kind of erratic, and flies in the face of human understanding as to why and how most animals migrate. Only the older tortoises make the roughly 6-mile climb out of the soggy jungle up into the hills—in this case, the slopes of Alcedo Volcano on Isabela Island. The journey is loosely related to mating, but researchers think there may be many other unknown variables at play. Whatever compelled these two lumbering giants up here, in about six months, they’ll start the slow climb back down to the jungle.Desktop Version

Jul 31, 2019Go climb a tree

This egg-shaped observation tower in Germany’s Bavarian Forest National Park is part of one of the world’s longest canopy trails—and one of the most distinctive. Visitors reach the tower via a nearly 1-mile-long elevated walkway that winds around the tops of firs, beeches, spruces, and more at eye-level. From the 144-foot tower, built over three ancient fir trees, they can see the vast expanse of Bavaria’s forests and countryside. Not only do canopy walkways like this one give visitors a bird’s-eye view of the forest, they also allow people to experience nature without harming it.Desktop Version

Aug 1, 2019Hawaii Volcanoes National Park turns 103

Let"s light some candles today—103 of them—for Hawaii Volcanoes National Park on the island of Hawaii. On this day in 1916, President Woodrow Wilson signed a bill to establish the park in what was then the US Territory of Hawaii. (Hawaii wouldn"t become a state until 1959.) The park contains a rich array of biodiversity, important historic sites of Native Hawaiians, and the glowing stars of the show—two of the world"s most active volcanos, Mauna Loa and Kīlauea.Desktop Version

Aug 2, 2019An uncommon look at an American icon

The tallest building in the world when it was completed in 1884, the Washington Monument was meant to capture the respect and gratitude American citizens have for our first president. The journey to build the obelisk was long and arduous, including a 23-year gap in the construction. According to Mark Twain, the incomplete monument looked like ‘a factory chimney with the top broken off.’ On this day in 1876 the Washington Monument was accepted into the National Park System, and today it’s one of the most recognizable buildings in the US.Desktop Version

Aug 3, 2019Cetacean Saturday

The US National Marine Sanctuaries system is a collection of 15 (and counting) protected marine environments, similar to our national parks. From August 2 through 4, the Marine Sanctuaries are hosting a "get into your sanctuary" campaign, to highlight the work they do. We"re joining them by showing this humpback whale breaching the waters off the coast of Maui. The Hawaiian Islands Humpback Whale National Marine Sanctuary is where many of these school-bus-sized whales gather in winter months to breed. But we"ll fly instead of swim there.Desktop Version

Aug 4, 2019Pups of the prairie

These swift fox pups make their home in Grasslands National Park in Saskatchewan, Canada. Historically, the range of this cat-sized fox stretched across the short grass prairies of Canada down through the central US to the Texas Panhandle. But as agriculture and settlements overtook open grasslands, swift fox numbers declined precipitously. By the 1930s, they had completely disappeared from the wild in Canada.Desktop Version

Aug 5, 2019A ‘Superior’ paddle

The Apostle Islands National Lakeshore off the northern tip of Wisconsin is a paradise for kayakers and campers, and those who like to combine the two. The park includes 21 islands which, if you’re willing to transport your own gear, offer uncrowded camp sites because, well, they’re islands. Once you’re in a kayak, you can explore some of the red sandstone sea caves, which are best appreciated from the water.Desktop Version

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