I have a long and well-documented habit of traveling ridiculous distances to stare at things the Earth made completely by accident. Mountains, waterfalls, caves, glaciers, bizarre rock formations and landscapes so absurdly photogenic that somewhere nearby there’s inevitably a viewing platform full of people fighting over the exact same Instagram photo.
That’s basically how Nature’s Humble Brag became a focus of DESTINATIONS UNKNOWN.
There’s something fascinating about arriving somewhere and realizing nature has been quietly showing off for the last few million years. Water cuts through mountains, glaciers bulldoze entire landscapes, rocks somehow end up balanced where rocks absolutely shouldn’t be balanced and erosion creates formations that humans immediately give stupid names because apparently “really cool rock” isn’t scientifically acceptable.
Of course, nature doesn’t always cooperate with the travel plans built around admiring it. Sometimes you fly halfway around the planet, drive six hours, hike through mud and arrive just in time for clouds to completely erase the mountain you came to see.
But when everything actually cooperates, holy shit.
Massive waterfalls, ridiculous mountains, turquoise lakes, glaciers, caves, canyons and landscapes stretching farther than you can reasonably comprehend have a way of reminding you that humans aren’t nearly as impressive as we’ve convinced ourselves we are.
I’m not a geologist, naturalist or anyone remotely qualified to explain exactly how millions of years of tectonic movement, erosion and other scientific shit created whatever I’m photographing. I just know when the planet has clearly spent an unreasonable amount of effort making somewhere look spectacular.
And apparently that’s enough for me to fly across an ocean, rent a car and spend several hours staring at it.
Because sometimes nature creates something so ridiculously impressive that the only reasonable response is to go stand in front of it and say, “Well… show-off.”
