10 Most Fascinating Deserts

Taklamakan (Central Asia): a desert covered with snowfall

Taklamakan is one of the largest sandy deserts in the world, ranking 15th in size in a ranking of the world's largest non-polar deserts. It covers an area of 270,000 km2 (100,000 sq mi) of the Tarim Basin, 1,000 kilometres (620 mi) long and 400 kilometres (250 mi) wide. It is crossed at its northern and at its southern edges by two branches of the Silk Road as travelers sought to avoid the arid wasteland.

In 2008, China's biggest desert experienced its biggest snowfall and lowest temperature after 11 consecutive days of snow. Snow is rare in the desert that covered 337,600 square kilometers, never before had the whole desert been covered.

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Lençóis Maranhenses (Brazil): a ‘desert' with lagoons

It seems incredible, but in a country that keeps around 30% of the fresh water and shelters the largest rain forest in the world, we can find a “desert”. Located in the State of Maranhão, on the north shore of Brazil, the Lençóis Maranhenses National Park is an area of about 300 square kilometers (155,000 ha) of blinding white dunes and deep blue lagoons, forming one of the most beautiful and unique places in the world. The dunes invade the continent over 50km (31 miles) from the cost, creating a landscape that reminds a white bed sheet, when seen from above.

But you may ask: -Lagoons?? You told me it was a desert… Yes, what defers this region from a desert is the amount of rain that drops over the dunes, creating ponds of crystal clear water on the depression between dunes. Despite its desert-like appearance, Lençóis Maranhenses records an annual rainfall of 1,600mm (i.e. 62.9 inches), 300 times more than in the Sahara. During the period of drought, the lagoons evaporate and become completely dried. After the rainy season, the lagoons are home of many species of fish, turtles and clams. The mystery in this story lies in the fact that when the lagoons fill up, life comes back, as if they had never left the place. One of the hypotheses to explain the phenomenon is that the eggs of the fish and crabs are maintained alive in the sand, exploding when rain comes back. (Link | Photo)

Salar de Uyuni (Bolivia): the world's largest salt desert

The Salar is one of the iconic images of Bolivia, a massive salt desert in the middle of the Altiplano. It is an expansive, virtually flat desert that reflects the sun in such a way as to create a mirror effect with the sky. There are several lakes in the desert with strange colours from the mineral deposits in the region.

Some 40,000 years ago, the area was part of Lake Minchin, a giant prehistoric lake. When the lake dried, it left behind two modern lakes, Poopó Lake and Uru Uru Lake, and two major salt deserts, Salar de Coipasa and the larger Uyuni. Uyuni is roughly 25 times the size of the Bonneville Salt Flats in the United States. It is estimated to contain 10 billion tons of salt, from which less than 25,000 tons is extracted annually.
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Farafra (Egypt): the white desert

A main geographic attraction of Farafra is its White Desert (known as 'Sahara el Beyda,' with the word 'sahara' meaning a desert). The White Desert of Egypt is located 45 km (30 miles) north of Farafra. The desert has a white, cream color (it is truly white, in clear contrast with the yellow deserts elsewhere) and has massive chalk rock formations that have been created as a result of occasional sandstorms in the area. (Link | Photo)

Atacama (Chile): the flourished desert

The Atacama Desert occupies the largest amount of the Chilean territory located north of the 29th parallel. The area located on the coast between Arica and Antofagasta appears in the Guinness Book of World Records as the driest place in the world. Nevertheless, to the south of the Tropic of Capricorn, the desert becomes kinder towards living beings. The coastal mists, "camanchacas", are more abundant south of Antofagasta and bring the humidity necessary for the maintenance of the coastal scenic vegetation. Many plants survive mainly because of the "camanchaca", and the harsh savings of water, in normal dry years, that causes them to delay important functions such as growth, to favor survival and reproduction. (Link)

Namib (Namibia): the only desert with elephants

South of Africa lies the Namib desert. which is less vast than the Sahara but just as impressive. It forms part of the Namib-Naukluft National Park with neighbouring Angola. The Sossusvlei sand dunes are the highest in the world, some towering at 300m high and if you are lucky enough, you can stumble across desert elephants-the Namib is the only desert in the world to have elephants. Apparently the oldest desert in the world, myriad species of plants and animals can only be found here. The Namib has fascinated geologists for years but it remains very little understood to this day. Off the coast, strong southerly winds with fogs and strong currents cause sailors to lose their way; the north coast has been named 'Skeleton Coast' due to the amount of shipwrecks found there, some of which can be found as much as 50m inland, as the desert slowly takes over the ocean as it moves westwards. (Link | Photo)

Simpson Desert (Australia): the red sand desert

Australia is home to four large deserts, popularized by Mad Max: Sturt's Stoney Desert, Tanami Desert, the Great Victoria Desert and the Simpson Desert, which is also known as 'The Big Red' due to the presence of dunes of red sand. The Simpson Desert is an erg which contains the world's longest parallel sand dunes. These north-south oriented dunes are static, held in position by vegetation. They vary in height from 3 metres in the west to around 30 metres on the eastern side. The most famous dune, Nappanerica, or, more popularly, Big Red (named by Simpson Desert traveller Dennis Bartell), is 40 metres in height. (Link | Photo)

The Black Desert (Egypt): the desert with black stones

Located 100km northeast of the White desert, the Black Desert is a region of volcano-shaped mountains with large quantities of small black stones. The stones lie out across the orange-brown ground, so that it is not quite as black as many people may hope for. Especially after visiting the White Desert, which has formations that are really white, many will imagine a desert as dramatic as this. Climbing one of the many soft peeks, the view from the top is really nice, with similar peeks continuing on into the haze. The Black Desert is uninhabited. (Link)

Antarctica: world's driest and wettest desert

Antarctica is a land of extremes. It's not inhabited year round by humans because it's simply too freezing cold. In 1983 scientists recorded extreme cold temperatures as low as -129 Fahrenheit. It's also the wettest place on Earth, but simultaneously the driest. The reason it's the “wettest” is not because of rainfall; since Antarctica is covered by 98% ice, it's technically very wet. However since it's also the aforementioned coldest place in the world, it gets very little precipitation – less than 2 inches a year. Which makes Antarctica a desert. A brutally cold ice desert with a massive trench full of even more…ice. Three for the price of one! (Link)

Sahara (North Africa): world's largest desert

The Sahara, with a size of 8.6 million km², is the world's largest desert, covering large parts of North Africa. Around 4 million people live there. Its maximum length is 4,800 km, running from west to east, and up to 1,200 km from north to south. Sahara covers most of Mauritania, Western Sahara, Algeria, Libya, Egypt, Sudan, Chad, Niger and Mali, and touches Morocco and Tunisia.

Sahara is very dry but there is an annual rainfall in most regions, although just a few dozen millimetres. (Link)

10 Very Unusual Graves

Graves of a Catholic woman and her Protestant husband, who were not allowed to be buried together. In the Protestant part of this cemetery, J.W.C van Gorcum, colonel of the Dutch Cavalry and militia commissioner in Limburg, is buried. His wife, lady J.C.P.H van Aefferden, is buried in the Catholic part. They were married in 1842, the lady was 22 and the colonel was 33, but he was a protestant and didn't belong to the nobility.


This caused quite a commotion in Roermond. After being married for 38 years, the colonel died in 1880 and was buried in the protestant part of the cemetery against the wall. His wife died in 1888 and had decided not to be buried in the family tomb but on the other side of the wall, which was the closest she could get to her husband. Two clasped hands connect the graves across the wall. (Link)


The Recoleta Cemetery is most famous for being the burial ground of Eva Duarte de Peron "Evita," but it actually holds many famous military leaders, presidents, scientists, poets and other important or wealthy Argentineans.

David Alleno was an Italian immigrant who dreamed of being buried in the prestigious cemetery where he worked as a caretaker from 1881 to 1910. He saved enough money to buy a space and built his own tomb. He even traveled back to his home country to find an artist who could carve his own figure in marble, complete with keys, broom & watering can. Legend says that after the tomb was finished David took his own life inside his grave, but many reputable sources say he died years after the tomb was constructed. (Link)


This headstone is also located at the Recoleta Cemetery in Argentina. What's unusual about it? Well, a man sitting on his sofa looking seriously at the horizon while a woman is seated in another one, at his back, but they are looking in opposite directions. They are placed like that because he died first, so the family made his Mausoleum. Some years later, when his wife died, in her testament she asked to be placed that way so as to represent their marriage: they spent their last 30 years without speaking a word. (Link)


Fernand Arbelot was a musician and actor who died in 1990 and was buried in the Pere Lachaise cemetery. He wished to gaze at the face of his wife for eternity. (Link)


This unique monument shows a young boy jumping upward, out of his wheelchair. Confined to the chair most of his young life, he is now free of earthly burdens. (Link)


Gravestones stacked around a tree which has grown up since part of the St. Pancras burial ground was cleared in the 1860's to make way for the London & Midland railway line. The young architect supervising the work was Thomas Hardy, the well-known author. (Link)


Père Lachaise cemetery in Paris is possibly the most visited graveyard in the world, and it's known as much for the beauty of its monuments as for the celebrity of its occupants. However, arguably the most dramatic tomb belongs to an author most people have never heard of.

Georges Rodenbach was a 19th century Belgian writer, best known for a book pretty much relegated to serious literary students. Bruges-la-Morte, a symbolic novel published in 1892, was about a man mourning his dead wife. So, it's painfully poignant that Rodenbach's tomb depicts a patina bronze likeness of himself actually emerging from the grave, with a rose in one hand. (Link)


When Jonathan Reed's wife, Mary, died in 1893, the widower didn't want to leave her side. In fact, he was so devoted that he moved into her tomb, where he lived (with a parrot) for over 10 years. Reed died in 1905 and was finally interred with Mary. (Link)


The most famous attraction in Hiawatha, Kansas is a 1930's tomb sitting in Mount Hope Cemetery near the southeast edge of town. John Milburn Davis came to Hiawatha in 1879 at the age of 24. After a short time, he married Sarah Hart, the daughter of his employer. Her family did not approve. The Davises started their own farm, prospered and were married for 50 years. When Sarah died in 1930, the Davises were wealthy. Over the next 7 years, John Davis spent most of that wealth on Sarah's grave.

The amount spent on the Davis Memorial has been estimated at anywhere between $100,000 and several times that amount. In any case, it was a large amount and included the signing over of the farm and mansion. This was during the Depression, when money was tight.

Several reasons are offered for the extravagance including great love or guilt, anger at Sarah's family, and a desire that the Davis fortune be exhausted before John's death.

The Davis Memorial grew by stages, which is bit of a shame. If it had been planned, it might have been built on a larger lot and made more attractive. The memorial began with a typical gravestone, but John worked with Horace England, a Hiawatha monument dealer, making the gravesite more and more elaborate. There are 11 life-size statues of John and Sarah Davis made of Italian marble, many stone urns and a marble canopy that is reported as weighing over 50 tons. (Link)


Jack Crowell owned the last wooden clothespin manufacturing factory in the United States. He originally wanted a real spring in the clothespin so that children could play on it. He is buried in Middlesex, VT. (Link)

10 Clever Ways People Make Money in Today's Economy

Star registry

Who owns the stars? Nobody, right? Therefore, you can put stars under your name and get certification for it! This, of course, comes with a price. International Star Registry (IRS),the original star registry that has been naming stars for people since 1979, allows you to do just that. Celebrities, dignitaries, and individuals all over the world have used its services to buy a star for friends and family.

The IRS offers a gift package wherein a special star is selected in the sky and you get your Star Name and Star Date recorded along with it. The gift package includes a beautiful parchment certificate, a sky chart with your name and the star's coordinates, and an informative booklet on astronomy. All names in the astronomical compendium will be published in Your Place in the Cosmos©, which is registered in the U.S. Copyright Office. However, this is not recognized by the scientific community. Stars' names are only reserved in the International Star Registry.

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Friend rental service

We all grew up being someone's friend, but we never got paid for it. Well, today is an entirely different era. You can now get paid for being a friend. All you have to do is create your profile in RentAFriend.com, set your hourly rate, and wait for somebody who is interested in hanging out with you. It's a win-win situation right there.

Rent A Friend allows you to create a free friendship profile, where you can charge up to $50 an hour to be rented for social events and activities such as weddings, sporting events, concerts, movies, operas, hiking, biking and dining.

Site owner Scott Rosenbaum got the idea from dating sites. He noticed that nobody was offering mere friendship and he wanted to "go a step back" from dating sites. Therefore, this is a strictly platonic website.
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Providing personal paparazzi

Celebrities aren't the only ones that can have paparazzi all around them. Now, you can hire your personal paparazzi for a day! This is how Celeb4aday.com makes bucks—by giving you the ultimate celebrity experience. It can be for birthdays, gag gifts, parties, bachelor & bachelorette parties, or ANY other event that requires The Star Treatment. Celeb4aday.com believes that the everyday person deserves the attention as much, if not more, than the real celebrities. (Link | Photo)

Face advertising

By selling their faces as advertisement space in buymyface.com, Ed Moyes and Ross Harper were able to pay off their student debt, which was £50,000, and finish college. Harper and Moyse paint ads on their faces and then photographed or filmed themselves doing funny things. Advertisers can pay for them to do several stunts, such as skydiving or plunging into cold water. All this is put up on the website, along with the name of the day's advertiser. When the duo started off, their first ad went for exactly £1. The young entrepreneurs say that they made £3,500 in their first ten days of business. However, they've managed to sell their faces every single day. (Link | Photo)

Tutorial marketplace

Student of Fortune is an online tutorial marketplace for those who need or can offer help with homework. If you're an expert on a subject, then go write great tutorials to earn lots of money, even thousands of dollars... all for helping students learn! All you have to do is look through other user's questions and find one that you think you can answer. Then, write up a custom tutorial that teaches the student how to solve the problem and submit it. 20% of the material will be shown, and if they think it's a good tutorial, they'll pay you for it! (Link | Photo)

Butterfly supplier

Selling butterflies and making millions? It doesn't seem conceivable, but Jose Muniz has managed to pull it off. You can get your very own live butterfly from Jose, who started the business based on a bet.

It all began when a friend bet him $100 that he could not sell butterflies for a living. Now, seven years later, the former business consultant and his wife, Karen, own Amazing Butterflies (amazingbutterflies.com), a live-butterfly distributor with offices in Tamarac, Fla. and San Jose, with a projected $1 million in revenue in 2006.
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Virtual real estate

Anshe Chung, or rather her real-life counterpart, Ailin Graef, has gained attention as the first person to reportedly become a real-world millionaire from her virtual-world business.

How'd she do it? She bought, developed and sold virtual real estate. While much of her wealth is still tied up in Second Life's currency, Linden dollars, those can be sold for genuine U.S. dollars. Graef reportedly makes upward of $150,000 annually.

Anshe Chung's achievement is all the more remarkable because the fortune was developed over a period of two and a half years from an initial investment of $9.95 for a Second Life account by Anshe's creator, Ailin Graef. Anshe/Ailin achieved her fortune by beginning with small scale purchases of virtual real estate which she then subdivided and developed with landscaping and themed architectural builds for rental and resale. Her operations have since grown to include the development and sale of properties for large scale real world corporations, and have led to a real life “spin off” corporation called Anshe Chung Studios, which develops immersive 3D environments for applications ranging from education to business conferencing and product prototyping.
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Selling Irish dirt

Alan Jenkins, a Belfast entrepreneur, and Pat Burke, an agricultural scientist from Tipperary, have already shifted around $1m (£512,000) of Irish muck to the United States.

Their company, called Official Irish Dirt, has also received online contacts from Irish people all over the world who are keen to get their hands on dirt from back home.

It was Jenkins who came up with the idea. During a visit to see friends in Florida he heard some Irish-Americans at a meeting of the Sons of Erin, a community organization for people with Irish ancestry, saying they would like to have some Irish sod placed on their funeral caskets. Soon afterward he met Burke, who worked at the Irish Department of Agriculture, at a dinner party and the business grew from there.

Since Auld Sod's Web site, officialirishdirt.com, went online, Burke says he has shipped roughly $2 million worth to the United States, where about 40 million people claim Irish ancestry, and Enterprise Ireland estimates annual sales of Irish gifts at more than $200 million.
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Socks subscription

An entrepreneur from Switzerland named Samuel Liechti had a crazy idea to start a company that would distribute socks to subscribers several times throughout the year. For nine pairs, each “sockscriber” pays a minimum of $89 annually to keep the socks rolling in. Surprisingly enough, there is an immense amount of people who are too lazy to grab a pair of calf-high socks at the store and subscribe to this silly service.

Each new "sockscriber" receives a calculation of how much time he will save by not making sock purchases: about 12 hours every year, or three weeks in the lifetime of an average Swiss male, which is estimated at 82 years. Liechti brought his "sock-scription" service to the U.S. in 2005. Two years later BlackSocks began selling subscriptions for underwear. Liechti now boasts 60,000 active customers in 74 countries. BlackSocks opened a New York office last year.
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Geese police

David Marcks discovered a lucrative business opportunity when he used his dog to solve a problem that he constantly faced while working at a golf course - the proliferation of geese.

David started Geese Police in 1986 as the solution to driving away unwanted geese from town parks, corporate properties, golf courses, or even front lawns. Using trained border collies, they drive away the geese without harming them. Today, Geese Police has considerably grown and expanded, earning just under $2 million in 2000. David has also begun marketing his business to a highly selective group of individuals.
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