5 RAREST PHENOMENA OUR EARTH OFFERS !

1. Spotted lake in B.C. Canada

The Spotted lake, or Kliluk, a strangely-patterned body of water, is a saline endorheic alkali lake, located northwest of Osoyoos in the eastern Similkameen Valley of British Columbia, Canada, accessed via Highway 3.

Spotted lake contains dense deposits of magnesium sulphate, calcium and sodium sulphates. It also contains high concentrations of eight other minerals and lower amounts of silver and titanium. During summer, much of the water in the lake evaporates, leaving concentration of these minerals that form the spots visible in the lake.

If you question, ‘Can I swim in Lake Kliluk?’, the answer is NO. It is because, the lake is considered as a sacred site thought to provide therapeutic waters for centuries. 

Travelers can just stop to view the site from the fence, that has been erected to protect the lake from liabilities of public access.

2. Starlings Murmuration

A flock of starlings is called Murmuration. A Starlings murmuration is a remarkable and one of the most beautiful phenomena to witness.

‘Murmuration’ is the name given to a large group of Starling flocks, when gather together to roost through the winter months. Starlings group together in numbers, to safeguard themselves from predators, such as peregrine falcons, which finds it hard to target one bird in the middle of a hypnotising flock of thousands.

The UK is a famous murmuration site. Some best places include,

• Fen Drayton, Cambridgeshire
• Brighton Pier, Sussex
• Middleton Moor, Derbyshire
• Ham Wall, Somerset
• Leighton Moss, Lancashire
• Albert Bridge, Belfast
• Aberystwyth, Ceredigion

3. Bioluminescence, Indian Ocean

Have you ever visited the exotic waters, like those surrounding the islands of the Maldives? 

If yes, then you would have witnessed this beautiful and awestruck phenomena that turns the night-time ocean into a field of glowing stars. This magical phenomena is caused by the bioluminescent plankton, that often appears in warm coastal waters.

Recently, it has been discovered by scientists, that these plankton glow when they are agitated. Bioluminescent plankton don’t glow all the time. It takes energy to make the chemicals that allow them to glow. Most of these plankton glow blue, but a few can glow green, orange or red. 

Another place where locals and holidaymakers report seeing this phenomena, as they break on the shore or shine as a surfboard cuts through a wake, is San Diego. Other countries that have reported sightings of bioluminescent plankton are Australia, Vietnam, Jamaica, Puerto Rico and Thailand.

4. Aurora Borealis, Norway

An aurora, frequently referred as polar lights, northern lights, or southern lights, is a rare phenomena, which is a natural light display in  the Earth sky, often witnessed in high-latitude regions.

To experience this incredible colors that move across the Arctic sky is on my bucket list, as many of yours. Few other places than Norway, offer more ways to witness the Northern lights.

Norway is dark from early afternoon until late morning, between September and March, and the northern lights frequently soar across the sky.

The best places in the world, to witness this unbelievable phenomena, are usually closer to Arctic circle, which includes, Alaska, Canada, Iceland, Greenland, Norway, Sweden and Finland.  Although you can also spot the southern lights in the southern hemisphere, northern lights is the star of the show.

5. Circumhorizontal Arc

A circumhorizontal arc is an optical phenomenon, that belongs to the family of ice halos formed by the refraction of sun or moonlight, in plate-shaped ice crystals suspended in the atmosphere, typically in cirrus or cirrostratus clouds. 

The term, “fire rainbow”, apparently coined in 2006, is sometimes used to describe this phenomenon, although it is neither a rainbow nor related in anyway to fire. This term might have originated in the occasional appearance of the arc as “flames” in the sky, when it occurs in fragmentary cirrus clouds.

When the sun is at an elevation of 58 degrees or greater, the sun-light has to enter the plate-shaped ice crystals in high-altitude cirrus clouds, at a specific angle. This makes the circumhorizontal arc a rare phenomenon.

This phenomenon was witnessed in South Carolina, on August, 2015.