Yellowstone National Park

Yellowstone National Park in Wyoming, USA

The first national park in the world, Yellowstone is home to Old Faithful Geyser, as well as the majority of the world’s geysers. Yellowstone features well preserved natural beauty, including its mountains, subalpine forest, canyons, rivers, and lakes. Yellowstone Lake is in the Yellowstone Caldera, an active volcano that is the largest in North America. The volcanic activity in Yellowstone is responsible for the geothermal features like the famous geysers

 The park also contains a variety of wildlife, including the Yellowstone Park Bison Herd, who roam free around the park. Other wildlife found around the park includes elk, bears, wolves, moose, and bighorn sheep.

Times Square in New York

Times Square in New York, USA 

One of the most iconic attractions in the world, Times Square has become a symbol of the bustling city and thriving culture of New York. Named for the newspaper The New York Timesafter it moved its headquarters to the square in 1904, Times Square is now a major entertainment center, home to television studios, businesses, and hundreds of bright flashing billboards.

Times Square is the most visited tourist attraction in the world, with about 40 million annual visitors. Every year since 1907, hundreds of thousands of people have gathered in Times Square on New Years Eve to watch the crystal ball drop at the strike of midnight, ushering in the new year. Today, millions of people flock to the square, and many more watch the celebrations on the annual New Year’s Eve television special.

Cueva de las Manos in Aegentina

Cueva de las Manos or Cave of hands in province of Santa Cruz, Argentina

Cueva de las Manos, meaning “cave of the hands” in Spanish, is a series of famous paintings on the walls of caves. Located in the Santa Cruz province of Argentina, the cave paintings date back to between 9,000 and 13,000 years ago, and were created by the hunter-gatherer people who resided in Patagonia. These communities were some of the earliest in South America, making this site very important. The caves were inhabited by several waves of people, though the most recent of these were probably ancestors of the Tehuelche people around 700 CE.

Archaeologists have found that the cave dwellers used pipes carved from bones to spray paint the cave walls, using their hands as stencils to create hundreds of silhouettes of their hands in varying shades of red, purple, yellow, and brown. Most of the hands are left hands, suggesting that the artists were right handed, and painted their own hands.

There is also art featuring humans and animals in hunting scenes, with the indigenous guanacos and rheas, as well as abstract designs like shapes and zigzags. The hunters are depicted using bolas, their traditional hunting weapons.

Alcatraz Island

Alcatraz Island – Famous Ancient Federal Prison in California, United States

Best known for its infamous federal prison and for its ancient lighthouse and fort – one of the earliest built on the West Coast of the US – Alcatraz Island has always captivated the imagination of its visitors. 1.25 miles across the water from San Francisco, The Rock stands tall – a typifying one of the harshest and most notorious pens of the world.

Alcatraz Island is spread over 22 acres and attracts thousands of visitors each year. Guided tours of the prison are favorites. Nighttime tours heighten the mystique of the Alcatraz Federal Penitentiary which had earned the reputation of being the ‘escape-proof prison.’
Before Alcatraz Island was turned into the site of the military and federal prisons, it was occupied for over a year and half by the Aboriginal Indians participating in a wave of Native protests starting in 1969. The Alcatraz Island is currently a national recreation area and a National Historic Landmark managed by the National Park Service as part of the Golden Gate National Recreation Area. Some of the main landmarks on Alcatraz Island include the Main Cell house, Lighthouse, the Parade Grounds, Building 64, and New Industries and Model Industries Buildings.

Alcatraz Island is not all creepy horror stories. Those who give their imaginations a break will find interesting natural formations such as rock pools and some beautiful birds such as the black-crowned night herons and western gulls, and reptiles such as the California slender salamanders in their natural habitats.