© 2021
In touch with the world ... at home on the High Plains
Play Live Radio
Next Up:
0:00
0:00
0:00 0:00
Available On Air Stations

Earth's natural wonders come in a variety of colors

While Earth is often thought of as a green- and blue-colored marble, there are plenty of natural wonders on the planet that come in an even wider variety of hues.

iExplore recently shared 10 of what it dubbed as the “World’s Craziest and Most Unexpected Natural Wonders.”

The planet we call home is full of variety, iExplore reports, including icy masses, humid jungles, arid deserts and jagged mountain peaks, as well as colorful bodies of water, caves and hills, to name a few.

In Colombia, a body of water exists that resembles a liquid rainbow. That’s because a plant called Macarenia clavigera blossoms there, making the water appear red, with patches of yellow, orange, blue and green.

In China, the Rainbow Mountains in Zhangye Danxia Landform Geological Park, caused by an ancient collision of tectonic plates that sent colorful sandstone and minerals to the surface, make it too, a rainbow-colored masterpiece of nature.

The Spotted Lake in British Colombia, doesn’t resemble other lakes. Mineral rich water in the lake evaporates every summer, leaving behind salt crystals and hundreds of briny, round – or roundish – green, yellow and brown polka dots on the water's surface.

Gypsum crystals in Mexico give theCave of Crystals its name. Some of the crystals found in the cave are 30 feet long and a meter thick, the result of thousands of years of maturing in an extremely hot and humid environment.

In Nevada, the Fly Geyser, which wasn’t formed entirely by nature, is a many-hued, bulbous formation created when thermal waters from a well, dug by a geothermic energy company, burst through a manufactured seal up to the earth’s surface. The structure’s continual growth is caused by minerals deposited on top, while thermophilic algae gives it its shimmery green, orange yellow and red color.

There is a bubble-gum pink lake in the land down under. Lake Hillier, Australia remains pink year-round, but how it gets is color remains a bit of a mystery.

As its name implies, Blood Falls is a blood-red colored glacier in Antarctica. Iron oxide stains the salty water, causing it to look like a blood waterfall is falling from the glacier. 

The moon and stars seem to go on forever in Salar de Uyuni, Bolivia during the wet season, when the world’s largest salt flat is transformed into a gigantic reflection pool, making the landscape appear as though it stretches on to infinity.

The Marble Caves in Chile resemble, as the name suggests, marble, complete with blue, yellow, and green hues.

On the northern coast of Brazil blue and white wavy stripes appear. The stunning visual effect is derived from watery pools nestled in between white sand dunes.