15 Amazing Castles from Around the Globe - StumbleUpon. Although designed and built for the prominent purpose of defense, today the castles seem like somewhat unrealistic constructions straight from the fairytale world. From solid strongholds to oriental fortresses and highly decorative palaces, the castles are our connection to the past, where legends mix with history and reality blends with a fairyland. This fairytale castle is the historical seat of the Prussian Kings and German Emperors.
Its origin dates back to the Middle Ages - it was built in the 11th century, then completely destroyed in 1423 and reconstructed in 1461. The view from the castle that stands on top of Mount Hohenzollern (855 m) is as stunning as the complex itself. Although it looks like a castle, Howard is actually a stately home - a private residence of the Howard family that has resided in the complex for more than 300 years. Segovia Castle, located in an ancient town of Segovia in central Spain, started off as an Arab fort in the 12th century. Burg Eltz castle. - StumbleUpon. Awesome pictures from around the world | Vivi The Mage. Someone sent me these in a chain email, it was horribly formatted. I also do not know who made the comments, or how accurate they are. I take zero credit in the pictures, I just wanted to compile them nicely for all to see. The world’s highest chained carousel, located in Vienna, the height of 117 meters.
Thor’s Well – “the gates of the dungeon.” Emerald Lake in the crater of an extinct volcano. Restaurant on a cliff on the east coast of Zanzibar.Depending on the tide the restaurant can be reached both on foot and by boat. Office of Selgas Cano in Madrid Desert with Phacelia (Scorpion Weed). Balloons in Cappadocia, Turkey. Dubai. And this is the view down These trees grow in the forest near Gryfino, Poland. The border between Belgium and the Netherlands in a cafe Twice a year in the Gulf of Mexico rays migrate. In the resort town of Skagen you can watch an amazing natural phenomenon. In the Chinese province of Shandong is a bridge across the Gulf of Jiaozhou. Day and night. Family photo Share! The living root bridges of India. When it comes to building green, nothing may be closer to the embodiment of the term than using materials that are actually still alive. In northeastern India, in one of the wettest places on Earth, such a practice has been going on for hundreds of years.
For proof, look no further than the "living bridges of Cherrapunji". Like something out of Disney theme park attraction, these incredible bridges are made from the roots of the Ficus elastica tree, otherwise known as a rubber tree. Besides the standard underground roots, this tree also shoots out secondary roots further up the trunk which are used to scale boulders, sip up water from rivers, etc.
In order to make a rubber tree's roots grow in the right direction -- say, over a river -- the Khasis use betel nut trunks, sliced down the middle and hollowed out, to create root-guidance systems. Now obviously, bridges such as these take a bit to be completed -- say, 10 to 15 years. Timpanogos Waterfalls - 360 Degree Panorama - Foto 360 - StumbleUpon.