Top 10 coolest place in the world

1. Stromboli, Italy

I thought Stromboli was an Italian food similar to a calzone. It took a book to enlighten me to the error. Stromboli is a very active volcanic island in the Tyrrhenian Sea. The thing is, people live on it. Imagine falling asleep to the gentle hum of liquid magma pouring out of the crater a few hundred feet from your house. Need to relax? Head to the Sciara del Fuoco, and watch as car-size molten boulders crash into the sea.

2. Seychelles

I had a teacher in high school tell me the most beautiful place on Earth was a tiny archipelago nation called the Seychelles. I’d never heard of it. It took the development of the internet (yes, I’m that old) to read about such a place. And since then, I’ve been dreaming about it ever since. White sand beaches. Crystal blue water. Warm ocean breezes. This is paradise defined. Of course, getting there is nothing short of being obscenely expensive. So, if you’d like to fund my trip, please e-mail the YesButNoButYes and put “Funding Echowood’s Trip” in the subject line.

3. Meteora, Greece

Sandstone pinnacles rising hundreds of feet straight into the air, capped off by 16th century Greek Orthadox monasteries? Is that something you might be looking for? Such a place exists, and it’s called Meteora. (Not to be confused with the Linkin Park album, which as far as I’m aware, has nothing to do with monasteries or sandstone … or Greece.)

4. Devil’s Hopyard, United States

The Devil’s Hopyard may not be as outstanding as Santorini, or Palau, but the legends it’s created are pretty interesting. (Cue Puritanical mythology via Curbstone) Of all the places in Connecticut bearing the Devil’s name, the one with the greatest variety of legendary etymologies is the 860-acre state park in East Haddam known as the Devil’s Hopyard. Here, the combination of booming Chapman’s Falls, pothole-scarred rocks, the unearthly quiet in the dark glen below the falls and the steep, cave-pocked cliffs flanking turbulent Eight Mile River makes a likely setting for the growth and development of legends. Then, too, the “hellish” appearance of the Hopyard’s gorge was probably enhanced for the early English settlers by local Indian tribes, which are said to have used Devil’s Hopyard for religious rites and powwows.

5. Palau

Take a long look at that picture and tell me you wouldn’t want to be there right now. Aside from a season of Survivor, Palau remains mostly paradise on Earth. There’s an interesting phenomenon in Palau known as Jellyfish Lake. The lake, once open to the ocean, closed up allowing for an amazing reproduction of Jellyfish. On the flip side, the lake has a layer of hydrogen sulfide beneath the surface which, after coming into contact with, would make someone’s day pretty horrible.

6. Santorini, Greece

Here’s an idea, let’s build a village on the edge of partially submerged extinct volcano. While we’re at it, let’s make it absolutely beautiful. Santorini is an island off the coast of Greece (part of the Cyclades), and it’s quickly becoming one of Europe’s hot spots. A giant central lagoon, more or less rectangular, and measuring about 12 km by 7 km (8 mi by 4 mi), is surrounded by 300 m (984 ft) high steep cliffs on three sides. The island slopes downward from the cliffs to the surrounding Aegean Sea. On the fourth side, the lagoon is separated from the sea by another much smaller island called Therasia; the lagoon merges with the sea in two places, in the northwest and southwest. The water in the center of the lagoon is nearly 400 m (1300 ft) deep, thus making it a safe harbor for all kinds of shipping. The island’s harbors all lie in the lagoon and there are no ports on the outer perimeter of the island.

7. Iguaçu Falls, Brazil/Argentina

Niagara Falls has nothing on Iguaçu Falls. The waterfall system consists of 275 falls along 2.7 kilometres (1.67 miles) of the Iguaçu River. Most of the falls are about 210 feet in height, and the average water falling over Iguaçu in peak flow has a surface area of about 40 ha (1.3 million ft²). The falls were also featured in Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull.

8. Oak Island, Canada

This is one of those things you hope is true. While not necessarily an amazing landscape, the story and legends of Oak Island bring out the Goonies in all of us. The long and the short of it is, there may or may not be a horde of pirate treasure buried in a pit on the island. (Some say the Holy Grail could be buried there too.) What we do know is over 200 years ago, some children found a depression on the island, started digging, and found a layer of flagstone a few feet down. Excavation continued with more discoveries of logs, charcoal, and coconut fiber, all placed there, seemingly, by humans.

9. The Giant’s Causeway, Northern Ireland

Have a thing for hexagons? How about basalt hexagonal columns? There’s no better place to find such a rarity than at the Giant’s Causeway.
Folklore has it that the Irish giant Fionn mac Cumhaill (Finn McCool) built the causeway to walk to Scotland to fight his Scottish counterpart, Benandonner. The more accurate, but less fun story behind the causeway states that during the Paleogene period, the region was subject to intense volcanic activity, when highly fluid molten basalt intruded through chalk beds to form an extensive lava plateau. As the lava cooled rapidly, contraction occurred. While contraction in the vertical direction reduced the flow thickness (without fracturing), horizontal contraction could only be accommodated by cracking throughout the flow.

10. Ngorongoro Crater, Tanzania

The Ngorongoro Crater is the world’s largest unbroken, unflooded volcanic caldera and the closest you may come to the Garden of Eden. What’s more, and because of its naturally occurring borders, it houses an amazing array of plant and animal life. There is even speculation that life on Earth originated from the extinct volcano. There are lodges and safaris touring the crater, and if you can get your hands on a ticket to East Africa, I’m sure you’ll find your money well spent.

Posted in: World Tour