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These places are beautiful and unusual at the same time. What secrets are they hiding? What features do they have? Check it out right now in our video!
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00:00The Javari Valley in Brazil is an untouched jungled area of 33,000 square miles, slightly
00:07larger than Austria.
00:09This place is protected to stop outsiders from entering.
00:13This isolated area is home to one of Brazil's largest indigenous territories.
00:20Here, uncontacted tribes with no understanding of the outside world can live peacefully in
00:25the jungle.
00:26Observation is only made by officials from the air.
00:30It provides a small glimpse and a better understanding of how early hunter-gatherer societies once
00:36lived.
00:38Up to 3,000 inhabitants within 14 different tribes live deep inside the reservation in
00:44up to 19 villages.
00:46This makes the Javari Valley one of the largest concentrations of isolated peoples in the world.
00:53It's illegal for outsiders to enter this area, as contact with outside humans would be volatile
00:58to the natives' health.
01:00These remote tribes haven't evolved an immunity to the many bacteria that we have, so it's
01:06crucial they are left alone.
01:09Within the Vatican, there is a massive secret storage room.
01:14It contains up to 52 miles of shelving for archives that date as far back as the 8th century.
01:22It contains many significant letters, books, and other documents from notable people collected
01:28by the Vatican.
01:31One letter from Abraham Lincoln here is from the 1860s discussing the progress of the USA
01:37with the Papal States.
01:39Another is from Queen Mary of the Scots when she sought help from the Pope in 1587.
01:45And there are even documents regarding the trial of Galileo in the 17th century as he questioned
01:51the true movements of the Earth moving around the Sun.
01:54There are 1200 years of documentation regarding world events.
01:59However, most of it is secret as access is only provided to academic researchers.
02:04And to be one of those, you will need to be the minimum age of 75 and must renew your
02:11request
02:11for access to the room every six months.
02:14And even then, while you poke through the secret documents, you are under constant supervision
02:19of the Swiss Guard.
02:20With so much secrecy, it would be interesting what else could be hidden in these confidential
02:25documents.
02:27Halfway between Hawaii and Australia lies the lonely Howland Island.
02:33It has a long history of being an isolated and unforgiving location.
02:38Since 1857, miners spent two decades extracting bird droppings that were centuries old, a valuable
02:45fertilizer at the time.
02:48The island was abandoned until 1935 when the USA attempted to make a colony there.
02:54They were excited to build its first airport.
02:57They expected it would one day be a great location for a stopover flight, creating an easier connection
03:03from Australia to California.
03:07A flight path had even been prepared on Howland Island for the arrival of Amelia Earhart.
03:12It was all set up as a landing point for her circumnavigational flight of the globe.
03:17Unfortunately, Amelia lost contact before making it to the isle.
03:22The dream of the airport to be used on the Trans-Pacific flight path was abandoned, and the colony soon
03:28dispersed
03:29with no further attempts to repopulate it.
03:31But the island is now a protected reservation for the fragile ecosystem that surrounds it.
03:37It's visited once every two years to assess the regeneration of wildlife, and no one is allowed to enter without
03:44official authorization.
03:48Heard Island is an offshore territory of Australia.
03:5280% of it is covered in ice, and it has the country's only active volcanoes.
03:57It's also surrounded by glaciers, with the highest descending to sea level from 7,900 feet.
04:03If you're lucky enough to gain authorization to access the island, you can do this only by sailing 4,000
04:10miles across rough seas.
04:12After you've successfully sailed the long voyage, you'll find yourself in this uninhabited 142-square-mile territory.
04:20Congrats! You've made it to one of the most isolated places in the world.
04:27Only whalers and sealers sometimes lived here until the 1880s, and since these whalers left, only researchers have made the
04:35daring voyage.
04:36Since 2011, no one has returned.
04:40All the buildings have broken down over the years from the extreme weather, so it's not the best option for
04:46a vacation.
04:47With freezing temperatures and powerful winds that can reach 110 miles per hour, only the hardiest of plants and animals
04:54can survive this place.
04:57In France, there's a network of caves, called the Lascaux Caves, that provides artwork that is truly unique.
05:06Wall paintings that date back 17,000 years ago from the early Magdalenian Age provide around 6,000 images.
05:13They decorate the walls, giving a great insight to what types of animals existed in that ancient period.
05:20Some of the animals portrayed have been extinct in France for thousands of years, like the ancient Oryx and Rhinoceros.
05:29Painted in a mixture of red, yellow, and black colors, made from several different mineral pigments, the pictures depict what
05:36hunter-gathering societies hunted from the region, but the ingredients were vulnerable from tourists' visits, which were then stopped in
05:441963.
05:45The carbon dioxide from the visitors' breath and presence of light caused lichens, crystals, and molds to appear in the
05:53caves, which provided potential damage to the minerals of the paintings.
05:58These caves are now heavily restricted for entry, but replicas of the paintings have been made available to provide a
06:05similar experience.
06:08Canada is the second-largest country in the world, although the northwestern part is mostly unpopulated.
06:15One island in this area, Devon Island, is the largest uninhabited island on the planet.
06:22It covers a massive area of 12,000 square miles, almost the same size as Croatia.
06:30People struggled to live in this desolate land.
06:32The Inuits tried for a while, but even they decided to give up on this unforgiving land in the 1930s.
06:39With low precipitation on the island, harsh winds, and freezing temperatures, it can only support microclimates of vegetation.
06:47Settlements were also abandoned in 1951, since they weren't economically viable with the limited resources Devon Island had to offer.
06:55However, today, due to its similarities with Mars, scientists make the difficult journey to research the island.
07:04The environment is very difficult to live in, with its poor terrain, freezing temperatures, and isolation.
07:10So, it's become a perfect match for NASA to test equipment and crew for future missions to Mars, the Moon,
07:17and even asteroids.
07:21Halfway between the North Pole and the northern coast of Norway sits the Svalbard Archipelago.
07:28This isolated island is covered by snowy tundra.
07:31It's virtually unlivable here.
07:33But, as you make the long journey, trekking through the snow, you might be lucky to reach the Svalbard Vault,
07:41poking out of a mountain.
07:43After accessing its daunting entrance, you follow through a long tunnel deeper into the mountain.
07:48You can hear constant noises from the cooling system all around you.
07:53This is to make sure the temperature is at a cool negative 0.4 degrees Fahrenheit, perfect for the contents
07:59it's preserving.
08:01As you reach the end of the tunnel, you enter the Svalbard Global Seed Vault.
08:07This is basically a safety deposit box holding the world's largest collection of agricultural biodiversity.
08:14Since its opening in 2008, 13,000 years of agricultural history have been accumulated,
08:20with over a million separate distinct crop samples stored here.
08:24The purpose of the vault is to provide a backup against any accidental loss of crops throughout the world.
08:31The 148 countries who deposit it into the vault can withdraw when they need to.
08:36However, it is heavily restricted, with only authorized personnel accessing the seeds within.
08:43In Brazil, there's an island just 21 miles from the coast.
08:48First, it's one of the most dangerous islands in the world.
08:51Filled with a lot of snakes, it's aptly named Snake Island.
08:56Golden lancehead snakes became marooned on this island when it separated from the mainland during the last ice age.
09:03From their isolation, they adapted to their surroundings, growing in numbers,
09:08and their venom becoming more potent with whatever prey they could find.
09:13Their venom is up to five times more powerful than their mainland cousins.
09:18And with the island the size of only 43 hectares, it's home to 4,000 venomous snakes.
09:24That's at least one snake per square foot.
09:27The island is restricted due to the highly venomous residents.
09:31Only officials and researchers observing the snakes are allowed access.
09:36But if you happen to be sailing by and your boat sinks, there's a number to call just in case.
09:42Just don't leave the beach.
09:47Ah, the desert welcomes you with challenging conditions of abandoned environments and extreme temperatures.
09:54Hey, some of us would prefer dessert, chocolate over sand and rocks.
09:58Oh well, just like cactuses and camels, buildings have had to adapt to these conditions.
10:03Here are some examples of astonishing structures in deserts.
10:07These structures are called Earthships.
10:09They're located in a New Mexico desert town.
10:11A large community of like-minded people lives in them.
10:15What's even more interesting is that the location of these buildings is registered as dumpsters.
10:21Maybe it's because all these structures are made out of old tires, bottles and cans.
10:26Earthships operate using green building principles.
10:29About 40% of a typical Earthship is built with natural or recycled materials.
10:34Imagine the walls made up of hundreds of used tires packed with dirt.
10:38Then there are layers of floor-to-ceiling passive solar windows.
10:42They gathered the sunlight during winter and reflected in the summer to keep the structures at a reasonable room temperature.
10:49You can see plants in corridors and glass bottles or aluminum cans stuffed inside walls.
10:54Certainly a distinct house in many ways.
10:57Mike Reynolds is an architect who noticed the alarming waste and consumption levels in the 1970s.
11:03He designed a fully sustainable home out of cans back then.
11:07Almost 40 years later, he becomes the one who brings together all the other Earth shippers.
11:13Reynolds drove a Mercedes, but it ran off of the vegetable oil he picked up at fast-food restaurants in
11:18town.
11:19A standard two-bedroom, two-bathroom Earthship costs about $250,000 in this town.
11:25Yet there are Earthships, like Dobson House, that can cost as much as $1.5 million.
11:31If you do it yourself, you know, with family and friends, you can eliminate the cost of labor.
11:36And it becomes relatively less expensive.
11:39Let's assume you're really going to build one.
11:41Where can it be?
11:42Well, anywhere.
11:43Earthships currently fit in the cold, dry air of Canada, as well as the hot and humid climate of Haiti.
11:50This is the Mirage Mirror House.
11:52It's an installation set in the Southern California desert.
11:56Mirage opened in 2017 as part of a contemporary art exhibition.
12:00It's composed of mirrors.
12:02This minimalistic structure blends with the environment around it.
12:06The doors, windows, and openings have been removed to create an amazing experience.
12:11What you have in the landscape is reflected back to you.
12:14How's it made?
12:15With mirrored surfaces.
12:17At night, the distant lights refract from the mirrors.
12:20In the daytime, the sky is transformed into banks of clouds.
12:24There's no fixed scenery in this house.
12:27How about seeing a futuristic structure in the deep desert?
12:31Architects designed a concept home that pairs perfectly with Elon Musk's cyber truck.
12:36The house has a post-apocalyptic theme.
12:39I mean, when I say post-apocalyptic, it's because I can't say it.
12:42Anyway, the house is designed to survive in a disaster scenario.
12:46The cyber house has steel gates, the windows are armored, and the exterior walls are made out of super strong
12:52material.
12:54Modern house is controlled by an autonomous geothermal heat pump.
12:57To put it in less sci-fi terms, you can keep the internal temperature steady.
13:02This sleek house has an entrance that can fit the cyber truck.
13:06After all, it's inspired by it in the first place.
13:09Plus, the cyber truck can be lifted to the second floor to be more secure.
13:15This is King Abdullah Petroleum Studies and Research Center in Saudi Arabia.
13:20Basically, it's a laboratory in a desert.
13:22It was designed to demand minimum energy.
13:25The architecture has patterns on the walls and ceilings, giving reference to the local tradition of geometric form.
13:32The next stop is Swartburg House in South Africa.
13:35This one is located near the Swartburg Mountains, but don't get too excited.
13:39It's on the edge of the Great Karoo Desert.
13:42It's a four-bedroom apartment.
13:44It has a special temperature-regulating system.
13:46The system works like a shield from the heat in the summer and as a sun trap in the winter.
13:51You're looking at the Grand Mosque of Djenné in Mali.
13:54This mosque is 52 feet tall.
13:57This is impressive because it's made of only sticks and a special mix of mud and other natural elements found
14:03in the desert.
14:05Petra is an ancient city hidden in the Jordan Desert.
14:08The structures are carved directly into red, white, and pink-colored sandstone cliff faces.
14:13It's located among the canyons and mountains near the desert.
14:16The place was a trade center many, many years ago.
14:20You might already see pictures of the impressive facade of the treasury.
14:23This structure still holds many mysteries in it.
14:26For starters, scientists can't explain how the Nabodians managed to create such a structure thousands of years ago.
14:33Did you know that there's another mysterious place in the middle of the desert that has a similar structure to
14:38Petra?
14:39Medaion Sile was like a second capital of the Nabodian kingdom.
14:43Yet another secret they left for us to decipher.
14:46It has over 100 decorated tombs and more than 1,000 non-monumental graves.
14:51Plus, inscriptions and cave drawings are also here, again surrounded by sandstone.
14:58This wooden shack was a post office once.
15:00The structure is in the Tengar Desert of Mongolia.
15:03It's surrounded by… nothing.
15:06Sand is the only thing that accompanies the lonely structure.
15:09The building is only 23 square inches.
15:12As you can guess, it didn't get too many visitors.
15:14It was abandoned for over 35 years.
15:17It's fate changed one day when a woman discovered the building.
15:21Mrs. Zhang and her friend came up with an idea.
15:24They were going to reach businesses and people who wanted to send letters and postcards from
15:28the world's loneliest post office without actually visiting the place.
15:32It worked.
15:33The post office rarely gets visitors in place, but it's busy online.
15:38Over 20,000 letters and postcards were sent from the desert post office in December 2021 alone.
15:44The place is about six miles off the nearest road.
15:47A post truck picks the letters up and hits the road for delivery.
15:51Eventually, they are shipped all over the world.
15:54A second destination in Saudi Arabia is King Abdulaziz Center for World Culture.
16:00The building has an interesting design.
16:02It took nearly a decade to build this complex structure.
16:05It's a 321-foot-tall tower, which stands out with its look.
16:10Stone Manor's pavilion is a stone structure in Palestine.
16:14The structure spans a surface area of 93 square inches.
16:17It has been built entirely out of 300 interlocking stones that mutually support each other.
16:23The concave roofs, and yes, they look like giant bowls, are designed that way to collect rainwater.
16:29The structure is in Iran.
16:31Interestingly, in Iran, the evaporation rate is three times faster than the world average.
16:37So, this bowl-like design comes in very handy.
16:40It captures the water in a way that the water can form a single mass as a whole before it
16:45evaporates.
16:46The outer shell of the roof system collects rainwater, but it also works as an additional shading.
16:51It makes air move freely, designed like a cooling mechanism for both roofs.
16:57Eco Lodge in Egypt is the next stop.
17:00The project is built in a place that overlooks the desert and is constructed using locally available materials like sun
17:07-fired bricks and palm wood.
17:08The building is an example of traditional architecture.
17:12There's a water basin that lets in the air to keep the interior cool.
17:16A worthy mention is the CID Interpretation Center in Chile.
17:20Chile's Atacama Desert is among the top tourist destinations in the country.
17:25To help the tourists, architects designed a visitor center as part of the infrastructure for the wind farm.
17:31Here, the cold winter months don't freeze people because the large windows make the most of solar heating.
17:37What's even more interesting is that the building is designed to go completely dark at night.
17:42Imagine you somehow bumped into the building by accident.
17:46Black Desert House is a building respecting the stars.
17:50At night, this house goes completely dark.
17:52It dissolves into the night, so the stars can appear more prominent.
17:57Now, any mysterious desert buildings you know that aren't on this list?
18:01Let us know in the comments!
18:05Octopuses have three hearts.
18:07Two of them pump blood to the gills, while the bigger heart circulates blood to the rest of their body.
18:12They also have nine brains.
18:14There's the large central one, but also, each of their eight arms has a mini-brain of its own, which
18:20is why they can act independently.
18:23Since each arm has its own brain, the central brain only needs to send a higher-level signal to the
18:28arm.
18:29Things like, move to that nearby crevice, there might be a crab hiding inside.
18:33In the case of humans, the brain would guide and take control of each movement of our legs and arms.
18:39And with an octopus, arms act almost independently on their way to the crevice.
18:44It also tastes and feels with the suction cups on it.
18:48Since their arms are so independent, an octopus doesn't actually know where they are unless it sees them.
18:54The human body has an ability called proprioception.
18:58Thanks to it, we know where our arm is, even if we hold it, let's say, behind our back.
19:051816 is known as the year when summer didn't come.
19:08In April 1815, there was a massive explosion on Mount Tambora in Indonesia.
19:14It sent enormous clouds of volcanic ash up into the atmosphere.
19:19The majority of the northern hemisphere got covered with a shroud of dust and dirt and kind of refused to
19:25settle.
19:26In June of the following year, the cold winter didn't just come to an end.
19:30Frost damaged crops and snow and rain persisted during the whole summer.
19:35In Iceland, you'll find some of the most breathtaking sceneries on our planet.
19:40Jagged mountains, fjords, hot geysers, ice fields carved into the landscape.
19:46Stunning yet intriguingly black sand beaches, such as Reynisfiara Beach.
19:51Most of the sand on beaches is generally formed from rocks that have broken down
19:55because of weather changes and erosion through thousands or even millions of years.
20:00And on Reynisfiara, the sand is a striking black color.
20:04And that's because of volcanic activity.
20:06Lava came out of an erupting volcano, got to the surface, cooled, and then hardened in the Atlantic Ocean,
20:13creating such a fascinating black hue.
20:15This beach is so magically stunning, but it's also very dangerous because of its sneakier waves.
20:21That's when a few smaller waves join together into a single really big one.
20:26This phenomenon can happen when ocean currents force waves together.
20:30Or in the case of Reynisfiara, when such waves come from an offshore underground cliff and get an even stronger
20:38pulling effect.
20:39Considering the ocean's low temperatures, too, it's definitely better to just take pictures from a safe spot.
20:46Some trees talk to each other.
20:48Not the way we do, of course, but…
20:50For example, acacia trees that grow over the African savannah can warn each other if there's something dangerous coming.
20:57When some animals, such as antelopes, gobble up its leaves, the tree immediately starts producing more tannin, which is toxic
21:05to animals.
21:05They also emit a special type of gas that travels through the air and warns other trees they should protect
21:12themselves, too.
21:13You're stargazing. Such a chill night.
21:16And then a flash of bright light streaks through the night sky.
21:19A shooting star. So cool.
21:22But what we see is not actually a star, although we call it that way.
21:26They're meteors, which are basically small chunks of dust and rock moving through space.
21:31As they're passing through our atmosphere, they cause something called friction when one thing rubs against another.
21:37And that's why they glow.
21:39Also, the friction causes heat.
21:42Dust and rocks get extremely hot as they fly through the atmosphere,
21:45and the heat makes them glow until the moment they burn out and turn into what we call the shooting
21:50star.
21:52Sunsets and deserts are extremely beautiful because of the spectacular colors they produce a bit more than elsewhere.
21:59Sunlight consists of various shades of the color spectrum.
22:02When the sun is high in the sky, these colors mix together and our eyes see them as white.
22:08But as the sun gets lower, its rays have to go through a thicker layer of atmosphere before they get
22:14to us.
22:15The atmosphere then scatters shorter wavelengths of light, like blue and purple, before we can even see them.
22:21That's why the longer orange and red wavelengths stand out.
22:24In urban environments, air pollution can make sunset colors duller than everywhere.
22:30The clean air in deserts allow the vivid colors coming from the sun to shine through a twilight.
22:36Also, the moisture, water vapor, and rain engorged clouds can mute the sunset's hues.
22:42Since there's no rain, clouds are thin and wispy, so they filter and reflect sunlight instead of blocking it.
22:49Bamboo grows really fast.
22:51It's actually the fastest-growing plant on Earth, sometimes growing about three feet in just one day.
22:57You can find it in dense forests, where only a little light gets to the ground,
23:01which means bamboo is under strong pressure to reach the sunlight as quickly as it can.
23:06There's an underground stem that connects bamboo shoots to their parent plant,
23:10so the shoot doesn't really need leaves of its own until it gets to its full height.
23:15Also, bamboo grows faster than other plants, because it doesn't waste its time and energy on growing rings that thicken
23:22the stalk.
23:23It's just a thin, hollow stick that grows straight up.
23:27You'll notice some of the big trees have shallow root systems, sometimes even 10 inches deep in the ground.
23:33The roots generally need access to oxygen and water, and they can mostly find it in special underground pockets called
23:40soil pores.
23:41When a tree has ideal moisture and soil conditions, it can send roots deeper down under the surface and get
23:48what it needs.
23:49But most of the time, conditions are not perfect, considering bedrock, stones, and compact soil that physically prevents the roots
23:56from going down.
23:58Such obstacles also prevent the roots from getting the needed oxygen.
24:01So, when life gets tough, the tree will take an easier option.
24:06Its roots will stay close to the surface and spread out in different directions.
24:10Drought conditions are another reason trees can have shallow root systems.
24:14By staying closer to the surface, they can take most of the rainfall collection.
24:19Plants are exposed to the sunlight most of the time, but they still don't get sunburned.
24:24They appeared on land about 700 million years ago.
24:27And one of the key things they needed to survive was something that would protect them against the ultraviolet rays
24:33coming from the sun.
24:34Those in the sea had seawater as protection.
24:38UV radiation is mostly responsible for sunburn, so land plants developed a special protein that detects it.
24:45This protein sends signals to the cells to protect the plant from the damage and effects of UV radiation.
24:52Basically, it's like they produce their own natural sunscreen.
24:55But this still doesn't mean they're 100% protected.
24:58You know that common belief that if you water plants in the midday sunshine, this can cause their sunburn?
25:05Some think droplets of water act as tiny lenses and then focus the sunlight onto the leaf surface.
25:11But they're not strong enough to actually focus sunlight from a water droplet onto the surface of a leaf.
25:17It's just that their natural sunscreen doesn't mean total protection.
25:21Too much exposure to UV radiation damages cells in the leaves and bark of the majority of plants.
25:29Earth's core is as hot as the surface of the sun.
25:32You'd think it could easily melt our entire planet, especially since the core is only 1,800 miles away from
25:38the surface.
25:39If the sun were so close, we'd be like french fries.
25:42But we're alive because the center of the sun is surrounded by a mantle of rock that's mostly solid.
25:48The crust we walk on actually floats on that mantle and protects us.
25:53If the sun was close, we'd only have empty space to protect us and you and I wouldn't be talking.
25:59Also, to melt the entire planet, you'd need way more energy than the heat in its core.
26:05So there.