We’re guaranteed to come across some things we can’t explain in life, but we may find that some are a lot more dazzling than others.
These ones may not even be so impossible to recognize, but the way they catch our eyes seem to stun our brains before they can catch up and identify these things. They’re increasingly rare, but those moments where we just stop for a second and lose ourselves in something we like always feel like invisible treasures.
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And while I can’t guarantee this list will give you one of those moments (since they work the best when we don’t know we’re having them), it’ll certainly provide a wealth of things to fascinate and stimulate.
At first, it probably seems like someone painted a nice mural of a forest near a mountain path.
In reality, however, this is just how the snow naturally formed on the side of the U.S. Bank Stadium. It turns out nature is quite the artist, too.
A lot of bikers will nickname cars “cages” as riding motorcycles seems like a much more freeing experience to them.
And so, when a biker passes on, the idea of bringing them to their final resting place in a hearse seems counter to their wishes.
It’s likely for that reason that somebody developed this coffin carrier that easily attached to a motorcycle for that appropriate last ride.
Here’s a question that seems simple enough until you actually try to answer it: Can you find the horizon?
The ocean blends so seamlessly with the sky in this photo that it’s hard to tell when one ends and the other begins.
Swimming in this must feel surreal.
Not to worry, this staircase in Oklahoma City is actually where it should be.
Apparently, it was suspended between these buildings by steel cables as some sort of sculpture.
It’s hard to tell what, if anything, it symbolizes, but there you go.
Something about these flowers seem a little off-putting at first.
If you think they look like little screeching monkey faces, then it shouldn’t come as a surprise that they’re known as monkey orchids.
This may not be exactly what Captain Planet had in mind, but we can definitely seem some powers combine here.
Specifically, four different saplings apparently came together to form the foundation for the tree growing out above them.
When it’s alone like this, it’s almost impossible to recognize this unless putting them together is your job.
What we’re looking at is just one LED tile from a 14 foot by 48-foot billboard. It serves as a good reminder of how easy it is to underestimate the size of those things.
Animals can come in a wide array of colors, but this palette still seems very unusual for a turtle.
And honestly, “unusual” is an underestimate because this is the albino Wood turtle, which is one of the rarest turtle variants in the world.
This is not a fire in the sky, nor is it a particular shiny moon.
Instead, it’s a particularly large light-up star that somebody put on top of a tall tree. It was hard to even tell there was a tree in that spot, wasn’t it?
Those of you who own a reflective jacket will likely recognize what’s going on here.
However, even among those folks, some may be surprised to learn that this photo was actually taken in a well-lit room with the flash on.
This Taiwanese fitness enthusiast has likely been working on his physique for quite some time by now.
What makes me say that you may ask? Well, the hat does a good job of obscuring this fact, but this man is actually 82-years-old.
Pretty wild, huh?
It may be a little hard to believe, but this is actually a watermelon.
For anyone curious about trying a yellow watermelon, however, the word is that they don’t actually taste that great.
Your mileage may vary, of course.
If you’re wondering where you can see this bizarre structure, I’m afraid that the answer is “nowhere.”
That’s because we’re not actually looking at a structure at all, but rather a long exposure shot showing the paths Northern Fulmar birds took as they flew over Skogafoss, Iceland.
If it looks like there’s some red lightning in the sky, that’s close to what’s happening here.
Technically, this is actually known as a sprite storm. The difference between those and regular thunderstorms is that sprites occur high above thunder clouds.
They can flicker in all sorts of shapes, but they’re often about this dazzling.
Nothing to see here, just a tree burning on the inside.
This can happen if a tree gets hit by lightening just right. It’s rare, but if you see one burning, be sure to contact your local fire service after taking the cool photo.
If you look closely, you might be able to recognize what’s happening here.
That’s right, somebody was a skilled or lucky enough photographer to capture the exact moment when somebody popped a bubble.
This hotel has a pretty simple system for figuring out what the weather is like.
Based on all the ways it can indicate changes in weather, this is one eloquent coconut.
I also feel like that last one involves a lot of faith that guests won’t try to steal it.
Macro photography is such a cool way to look at the world.
Imagine how many tries it took for the photographer to not just get a perfectly crisp image, but to get one of a perfectly formed snowflake before it began to melt.
The bushfires in Australia have gotten so bad that even backyard pools are being used as water sources.
The government has made it legal for crews to fight the fires by any means necessary, including “stealing” from citizens, but I think most people with homes near the fires would be happy to let them take it.
Medina’s Haram Piazza is kept cool with dozens of giant, square umbrellas.
They provide shade for prayers both from the desert sun and the occasional rain shower.
They also make the whole piazza look like a scene out of Star Wars .
Under the right conditions, these streaks of light can be seen by more than just people who forgot their glasses.
In this case, those conditions apparently involved -10 degrees Fahrenheit temperatures and some light snow.
I’ve seen saplings beginning to work their way between bricks, but this tree is proving that life, uh, finds a way.
The building appears to be abandoned, which likely allowed the tree to grow undisturbed for a long time. Often, seeds and moisture begin to get in through cracks or broken windows, which can cause plants to begin growing indoors.
When you think of planets and their rings, it’s hard to actually imagine the sheer mass and density of them. They seem ephemeral, floating up there in space.
But then you see images like this of Saturn and the depth of the shadows cast onto the planet by the foreground rings and the planet onto the rings behind really give you a sense of how solid they really are.
This may look like another cool space photo, but it’s not. It’s Burning Man.
Whatever you may feel about the festival itself, you have to admit that it looks pretty damn cool from above.
A jackrabbit may have “rabbit” in its name, but it’s actually a hare.
The name comes from how their giant ears reminded people of those found on donkeys, or jackasses, and thus, the name stuck.
The ears help regulate the hare’s temperature through constraining or expanding the blood vessels inside.
There is something so beautiful about a quiet morning after a night of snowfall — at least, until you start shovelling.
The same trapped air that quiets the vibrations of sound also acts as an insulator, which is part of why igloos work as shelter from the cold and why you should bury yourself in snow if you get trapped outside in winter.
Whether we’d like it to or not, this resin kitchen floor doesn’t always display these spellbinding patterns.
Instead, the uploader said they hid a glow-in-the-dark galaxy in the floor so its true beauty won’t reveal itself until the lights go out.
That probably makes it much easier to clean the floor.
Dam, that’s interesting.
Okay, now that I have the pun out of my system, can we just take a moment to appreciate how freaking amazing dams are? The sheer feat of engineering is mind-boggling.
Whenever someone tries to argue that a sunburn is “just dead skin” and nothing to worry about, I’m going to tell them this.
The cells are committing suicide to protect you, so the least you could do is help them out by applying a layer of sunscreen on a sunny day.
When I have to dismantle something for repairs, the most I find is dust and bugs.
But this is what one person found after taking the sides off of an old dryer. The small amounts make it seem like the bills didn’t get there on purpose.
This is an example of something that I find really clever, but also kind of hate the person behind it at the same time.
It’s really hard to tell, but that truck isn’t actually open. It’s actually painted to look like it’s open. Which is a neat trick, but would also distract the heck out of fellow drivers.
This is a prank I can really get behind, though.
A Christmas tree is a cheerful way to celebrate the holidays, but it suddenly becomes creepy if you stumble up on one in the middle of nowhere.
That’s what happened here. The clever tricksters hooked the power up to a mini solar panel.
These may be called dead man’s fingers, but I assure that we’re looking at something much less macabre.
They’re actually just a fungi that isn’t even known for being poisonous. Harmless as they may be, it’s still not a good idea to eat them.
There’s a time in every fork’s life (?) that it looks like this.
Most of the time, the familiar prongs are then cut into the forks so we can actually use them.
This time, however, it seems that somebody forgot that step.
