The inner city of the ancient Silk Road oasis of Khiva has been unchanged for centuries. Surrounding 40ft-high snake walls that writhe around the city have protected it for centuries, enabling defenders to shoot, spear, and pour burning hot oil on attackers from three sides.

Khiva’s labyrinth of narrow lanes adorned with blue and aquamarine tile mosaics is a living museum for you to explore. On the Oxus or Amu Darya River in deepest Central Asia, Khiva was ancient when Alexander the Great seized it in 329 BC.

It survived the depredations of Arabs in the 8th century, Mongols in the 13th, Tamerlane in the 14th. The Khanate of Khiva continued to flourish on the Silk Road until conquered by the Russians in the 19th. Today in Uzbekistan, it remains as the best-preserved of the ancient oases of the Silk Road, yet unknown to the outside world.

It need not remain unknown to you, however. We were just here two years ago, and will be here again soon. Join us and make Khiva a part of your life.(Glimpses of Our Breathtaking World #226 photo ©Jack Wheeler)

We’re on the island of Yap in Micronesia – some 500 miles southwest of Guam and 1,200 miles east of Manila in the Western Pacific. The Yapese have lived here for over 2,000 years, and have maintained their culture and traditions to this day.

Phenomenal navigators in their outrigger canoes, in ancient times they began sailing to Palau over 250 miles south to quarry large sections of limestone and return to stone-chisel them into circles with a hole in the middle (through which world put a long pole for carrying them.

Called Rai, they have been Yap’s currency for two millennia. The ones you see here are typical size but many are much larger, weighing as much as a car. Rai are the world’s biggest money – used not for day-to-day transactions but large ones like a bride’s dowry and wedding party, or a real estate deal.

The Yapese are a proud and peaceful people who live by their code of Respect and Responsibility. They are warm and welcoming to visitors. A 90-minute flight from Guam makes it easy to get here. Spending time with these special people will be life-memorable. (Glimpses of Our Breathtaking World #216 photo ©Jack Wheeler)

June 2002, the Vulture’s Mouth Glacier. In the deepest heart of the Gobi Desert of Mongolia, south of the Flaming Cliffs where Roy Chapman Andrews discovered dinosaur eggs in the 1920s, there is a naked spine of mountains called the Gurvan Saihan. In the Gurvan Saihan there is a deep gorge called Yol Alyn, the Vulture’s Mouth. And in the Vulture’s Mouth, there is a glacier.

It is not a big glacier, the continual ice buildup of a stream that never melts even in the heat of the Gobi summer. Yet it is a glacier nonetheless, thick enough for my son Jackson and I to walk on for more than a mile. The Vulture’s Mouth Glacier is just one of a multitude of extraordinary experiences Mongolia has to offer the explorer. Are you up for exploring it with me next June of 2026? (Glimpses of Our Breathtaking World #90 photo ©Jack Wheeler)

The architectural wonder of the Hanging Monastery was built on a vertical cliff face by the Tuoba people of Inner Mongolia over 1,500 years ago (in the 490s). Devout Buddhists and brilliant engineers, they defied gravity by inserting huge wooden crossbeams deep into the cliff to suspend the monastery’s temples, shrines, and monks’ living quarters, connected with bridges, corridors, and boardwalks, out into space.

Liao Mongols in the 900s rebuilt and sustained it, and it has been carefully refurbished and restored in the centuries since. While it remains primarily Buddhist with statues and depictions of Sakyamuni (the historical Buddha of 5th century BC) and Maitreya (the future Buddha), the monks welcome reverence to Taoism and its founder Lao Tzu (4th century BC), as well as Confucius (551-479 BC). Thus you also see shrines and statues of them like nowhere else.

It is a unique and inspiring experience to be here. We’ll be here again in our exploration of Inner Mongolia. ((Glimpses of Our Breathtaking World #116 photo ©Jack Wheeler)

The spectacle takes place in the fall at the May Day Stadium in Pyongyang. I attended in 2010 and 2012. It has to be seen to be believed. You’re looking at 10,000 dancers, acrobats and performers on the stadium floor. The background screen of a rising sun and Korean letters is a “card stunt,” 30,000 students holding colored cards composing it.

The number “65” is for the 65th anniversary of the surrender of Imperial Japan in World War II (August 15, 1945 – I took this photo in 2010), their Liberation Day (our V-J Day). The snowy mountain depicted below the 65 is Mount Paekdu, where all North Koreans are taught their country’s founder Kim Il-sung defeated the Japanese and won the war (he was actually at a Soviet army camp near Khabarovsk, Siberia at the time).

They are never taught a word about the events a few days prior to their Liberation Day (i.e. Hiroshima and Nagasaki), nor to whom the Japanese surrendered. Hands down, NorkLand is the world’s most bizarre country. (Glimpses of Our Breathtaking World #88 Photo ©Jack Wheeler)

As you can see, this place is aptly named. It is simply phantasmagorical – nature on LSD. Then again, so much of southern Utah is too, for close by Escalante are the Vermillion Cliffs, Capitol Reef, Bryce Canyon, Zion Canyon, Monument Valley and a lot more.

The entire area is Navaho country, so it is no surprise their native religion is based on peyote, a cactus containing the hallucinogen, mescaline, with the Navaho belief that nature surrounding them was designed by the Peyote Bird.

However, it is not necessary to take any hallucinogen to achieve a sense of ecstasy being here – just a deep appreciation of what a wondrous world – a breathtaking world – it is that we are all privileged to be alive in. (Glimpses of Our Breathtaking World #180 photo ©Jack Wheeler)

Do an internet search for “25 Most Mysterious Places on Earth” or similar listing, and almost always the Regaleira Initiation Well in Sintra, Portugal will be there. Since the photo is almost always looking from the top down, I thought you might like to see one from the bottom up, which is just as dramatic.

The Regaleira is a spectacular Gothic mansion with acres of gorgeous gardens built by a 19th century Portuguese-Brazilian millionaire, Carvalho Monteiro (1848-1920). I love it that his exotic eccentric extravaganza, his Regaleira Palace, was built by private capitalist with his own money – not some feudal king with money extracted from the peasantry.

I took this picture with fellow TTPers on one of our Portugal Explorations. Portugal really is a land of wonders, which I hope you’ll someday experience with Rebel and me yourself. (Glimpses of Our Breathtaking World #167, photo ©Jack Wheeler)

April, 2003. On my 21st expedition to 90 North, the geographic North Pole, I took my son Jackson. He was nine, but handled it like a trooper. And no wonder – it was his third time! The first was when he was just six, following his brother Brandon whom I had taken to the Pole back in 1990.

We landed our ski-equipped Twin Otter on the sea ice – and as it’s featureless with the ice slowly moving on the Arctic Ocean surface, nothing stays there for long. So if you want a physical candy-stripe North Pole, you have to bring your own! It is so indescribable to actually be on the very top of our planet that it has to be experienced to be understood. (Glimpses of Our Breathtaking World #95 photo ©Jack Wheeler)

This is a Hoatzin. I took this picture in the Amazon jungles of Colombia, its native habitat. It has no genetic relationship to any other bird, and thus has its own family, the Opisthocomidae, and its own suborder, the Opisthocomi. Extensive DNA-sequencing demonstrates that “the hoatzin is the last surviving member of a bird line that branched off in its own direction 64 million years ago, shortly after the extinction event that killed the non-avian dinosaurs.”

The Hoatzin is the Dinosaur Bird, the only bird on earth directly descended from the dinosaurs. It makes weird noises – grunts, hisses, groans and croaks – no melodious birdsongs. It emits an awful smell due to its fermentation digestive system, and tastes just as awful so no one hunts it for food. Yet it is distinctively pretty in a hyper-funky way. Spend enough time exploring the Amazon, and you may be lucky to see one. (Glimpses of Our Breathtaking World #186 photo ©Jack Wheeler)

In 52 AD, St. Thomas the Apostle, one of Jesus’ 12 Disciples, sailed down the Red Sea and across the Arabian Sea to the Malabar Coast of Southwest India to preach the Gospel of Christ. He found a receptive audience among the peaceful fisherfolk in the villages along the coast – so receptive he established a series of churches that still exist today. Some remain small and humble, others like the one above rebuilt with soaring glass and stone.

There are many Christian denominations in the Indian state of Kerala, which has the entire Malabar Coast, from the original St. Thomas Syrian Christians to Catholic, Pentecostal, Charismatic and others. Of Kerala’s 34 million people, at least 20% are Christian. Kerala is a place of relaxing beauty and peaceful serenity. The best way to explore it is via a luxurious houseboat along the many canals or “backwaters” dotted with fishing villages and churches. You’ll be warmly welcomed. (Glimpses of Our Breathtaking World #155, photo ©Jack Wheeler)

The leatherneck sea turtle is the world’s largest turtle, weighing up to 1500 pounds. This female was about half that. They have an enormous range, all the way from the North Sea to South Africa in the Atlantic, spending their lives at sea eating jellyfish – except when a female comes ashore to her hatching beach and bury her clutch of eggs in the sand above high tide.

Dropping several dozen glistening white golfball-size eggs into a depression scooped out with her flippers, she covers them up with sand, and heads back to sea, never to see them again. More than two months later, the born hatchlings dig out of the sand and wiggle their way into the sea, where the lucky ones survive.

I was able to watch this mommy’s entire egg-birthing process at dawn on a remote beach in the West African country of Gabon. It was such a privilege to witness an act of elemental nature by such an extraordinary creature. (Glimpses of Our Breathtaking World #127 Photo ©Jack Wheeler)

Toledo, Spain. As you drive up the hill upon which this ancient city sits, at the city’s entrance you are greeted by this statue. It is of King Alfonso VI of León and Castile (1040-1109) holding his sword as the Christian cross symbolizing his liberating Toledo from Moslem rule.

The sword has been the symbol of Toledo for over two millennia. In 193 BC, Romans founded the city as Toletum, where their blacksmiths developed a process of making swords of layered steel with different carbon contents, known to history as “Toledo steel,” the finest in the world for millennia until the hi-tech methods of today.

With Fall of Rome, Christian Visigoths ruled Spain from their capital here at Toledo – known as “Holy Toledo,” the center of a flourishing Christian civilization for 300 years until it was overrun by Moslems spreading Islam from Africa in the early 700s.

It was Alfonso VI who liberated Toledo from the Moslems in 1085. It was his great-grandson, Alfonso VIII (1155-1214) who led 30,000 knights in a surprise attack on 200,000 Moslems at the Plains of Tolosa in 1212 to destroy Moslem rule in Spain.

Today, Toledo is a small town of some 50,000, charming, historic, and peaceful. It’s one of the special places places to visit whenever you decide to explore Spain. (Glimpses of Our Breathtaking World #170 photo ©Jack Wheeler)

July, 1973. The Hellespont is the famous strait separating Europe from Asia, where the Black Sea after flowing through the Bosphorus at Istanbul and a widening called Marmara empties into the Aegean Sea of the Mediterranean. One of the great stories of Greek Mythology is Leander swimming the Hellespont to tryst with Hero, the woman he loved but was forbidden to see.

Thus he swam at night, and she lit a torch for him to swim to. One night a storm blew out the torch and the strong currents swept Leander onto the rocks to drown. So I first swam the Hellespont at night in 1960 and almost drowned myself (LIFE Magazine, Dec. 12, 1960, pp 91-94).

This was the second time, swimming from Leander’s village site of Abydos on the Asia side to Sestos, Hero’s village site on Europe’s. Here I am having reached the Sestos shore.

The Hellespont is where the Trojan War was fought, where the Persians crossed to lose against the Greeks at Marathon and Salamis, where Alexander crossed to conquer the Persian Empire. Lord Byron swam the Hellespont in 1803 to make all the legends and history a part of his life. I was determined to do the same, twice to make sure. (Glimpses of Our Breathtaking World #100 photo ©Jack Wheeler)

Yes, that’s me, waving from one of the cave openings on the cliff face honeycombed with 2,000 year-old Sky Caves in a remote region of the Himalayas called Upper Mustang.  The photo was taken by one of your fellow TTPers on our most recent Himalaya Helicopter Expedition last Fall.

Upper Mustang is ruled by the Tibetan Kingdom of Lo, created by Tibetan warrior-king Amne Pal in 1380, with its sovereignty protected today by Nepal from the Chicoms right across the border in Chinese-Occupied Tibet.  Lo, with its capital the medieval walled city of Lo Manthang, is where you will find the most traditional Tibetan culture left on our planet.

You can experience it yourself on our Himalaya Helicopter Expedition next year. If not now, when? Carpe diem.

(Glimpses of Our Breathtaking World #250 photo ©Jack Wheeler)

There are two Congos in Africa. The better known is the former Belgian Congo, once known as Zaire, now DR Congo (for Democratic Republic), also called Kinshasa Congo after its capital.

The lesser known is the former French Congo, now Republic of Congo, or Brazzaville Congo after its capital. Brazzaville is on the north side of a widening of the Congo River known as the Stanley Pool, while right across from it on the south side is Kinshasa.

It is in Brazzaville that you will find this magnificent monument to Christianity, the Cathedral of Sainte-Anne, with its roof covered in gleaming green-turquoise tiles, huge copper doors, and soaring arched interior bathed in sunlight. The people of Brazzaville are joyously Christian, attending 5pm Mass dressed in their most colorful finery. You’ll see Christianity truly come to life here. (Glimpses of Our Breathtaking World #174 photo ©Jack Wheeler)

The Boru Harp, attributed to the one and only High King of the entire island of Ireland, Brian Boru (941-1014), is the only musical instrument that is the national symbol of a country - the Republic of Ireland. It is also on the label of Guinness beer. Beautifully and exquisitely made, the Boru Harp is on display in the famous Long Room of the Trinity College Library in Dublin. You’ll experience a sense of awe when you see it for yourself. (Glimpses of Our Breathtaking World #219 photo ©Jack Wheeler)

The Buyi are the indigenous people of Luoping in northeast Yunnan, having lived here for many thousands of years. A peaceful agricultural people, for some 2,000 years they’ve been growing what we call rapeseed for vegetable oil. (Actually, we call it canola oil as “rapeseed” has unfortunate connotaions.)

Their multilevel terraces of bright yellow rapeseed flowers blooming in early spring (February-March here) – the Luoping Flower Fields – are world wonders of natural art.

They are marvelously friendly and hospitable – watch out for drinking rice wine with them, though, it’s seriously strong! These two Buyi kids exemplify what a joy they are to be with amidst their astounding fields of beauty. (Glimpses of Our Breathtaking World #276 photo ©Jack Wheeler)

July, 1972. That’s what these people were known as back in 1972 who lived in the Amazon forests south of the Napo River in Ecuador killing anyone foolish enough to enter their territory. The Quechuas living along the north bank of the Napo were terrified of them, calling them “Aucas” – naked savages. I found them, as you can see, naked but not savage.

This was a true first contact. A helicopter pilot friend, Tony Stuart, and I chanced upon them, landing in their clearing. We were literally space aliens in a space ship from outer space, for all they knew was the jungle. They had nothing from the outside world. I gave them a box of matches which was the most exciting thing they had ever seen. Despite their fearsome reputation for killing outsiders including missionaries, they smiled and laughed like anyone else.

They also understood trade and exchanging gifts. Beside the matches, we gave them some rope and a small machete (first metal they had ever seen). They gave (without our asking) Tony a hand stone axe, and me a blowgun. After a few hours it was time to go. Our goodbyes to each other were with huge smiles. I will never ever forget them. (Glimpses of Our Breathtaking World #113 photo ©Jack Wheeler)

This is Dhaulagiri – Dazzling White Goddess in Sanskrit – the 7th highest mountain in the world at 8,167 meters, 26,795 ft.  By consensus of the world’s mountaineers and trekkers, it is the most beautiful mountain in all the Himalayas.  Dhaulagiri stands alone, not a part of any mountain range.  Far below its east face is the Kali Gandaki River which originates on the Tibetan Plateau.   On the other side of the river rises Annapurna, the 10th highest on earth at 8,091m/26,545ft.  The river between them is at 2,520m/8,270ft – a difference of well over 18,000 feet making the Kali Gandaki Gorge the deepest in all the world.

You’re looking at the Northeast Face with the North Face to the right.  Our helicopters fly past this and around to the West Face where the climbers’ base camp is.  Being here is thrilling beyond words.  To be with me here, join me on my next Himalaya Helicopter Expedition. (Glimpses of Our Breathtaking World #302, photo ©Jack Wheeler)

It is a profoundly somber experience to stand here on this abandoned weed-strewn airstrip. For this is Runway Able on Tinian Island in the Northern Marianas, where 80 years ago, on August 6, 1945, a B-29 nicknamed Enola Gay piloted by Capt. Paul Tibbets took off with Little Boy in its bomb bay bound for Hiroshima – and three days later on August 9, a B-29 nicknamed Bockscar piloted by Maj. Charles Sweeney flew off with Fat Boy in its bomb bay headed for Nagasaki.

As a consequence, on August 15, Emperor Hirohito announced the surrender of Japan to America. Here is where World War II was won, and the Nuclear Age begun.

This lost bit of tarmac is the most consequential airstrip on earth. Be prepared for a deep complex of swirling emotions if you ever stand here yourself. (Glimpses of Our Breathtaking World #14 photo ©Jack Wheeler)

Some three hours’ drive east of Rangoon brings you to Mount Kyaiktiyo, at the top of which (3,600ft) is a gigantic granite boulder covered in gold leaf perched on the edge about to fall off. But it never does, held in place, legend says, by a strand of the Buddha’s hair put underneath it 2,500 years ago. Ever since, the Golden Rock has been a sacred pilgrimage site for the Burmese people and Buddhists around the world.

There are very few people here other than pilgrims, who devoutly pray, circumambulate the rock, and reverently place small strips of gold leaf upon it. It’s a marvelous experience to be among them. I plan to be here once again in an expedition soon – you might consider joining me. (Glimpses of Our Breathtaking World #112 photo ©Jack Wheeler)

Here in Zambia and elsewhere in Africa, crocodiles are nicknamed “Flatdogs.” You can see why. They spend much of their lives lying flat on the mud bank of a pond or river. Yet when on the hunt they can attack with astounding speed and surprise, leaping unseen from muddy water upon an unsuspecting target twenty feet away in an instant. This happened to a young boy fishing along the Luangwa River near our encampment just days ago. Africa is unforgiving of the unwary. (Glimpses of Our Breathtaking World #142 Photo ©Jack Wheeler)

October 1987, on an overland expedition across the entire Chang Tang Tibetan Plateau. Here is where you find the warrior nomads of Tibet, the Khampas. Renowned and feared for fierceness, they couldn’t have been friendlier to me when I gave them each what they treasured most in the world – a photo of His Holiness the Dalai Lama, far more valuable to them than gold.

Before, they were suspicious and angry at a stranger intruding upon them. Instantly with gifting the photos, they were joyous and smiling. They had no idea who I was, all they knew was that I was their friend, insisting I sit down and have a cup of yak-butter tea with them. It was the most memorable cup of tea in my life. (Glimpses of Our Breathtaking World #55 photo ©Jack Wheeler)

Yes, these are the actual legendary walls of Troy that Homer immortalized in the Iliad. Or what remains of them 3,200 years later. You see here the East Gate of Troy VIIa, the layer demolished in ashes archaeologists believe where the historical basis of the Trojan War occurred in 1180 BC.

This was Troia or Ilium for the ancient Greeks, after the city’s founder Tros and his son Ilus. They firmly believed what Homer described was real history, and the heroes portrayed – Achilles, Hector, Odysseus, Ajax, Patrocles, Paris and Priam – really lived. They knew just where it was – in the northwest corner of what is now Turkey they called the Troad where there were ruins with the tomb of Achilles.

Alexander the Great so firmly believed it was all true that when he crossed the Hellespont in 334 BC to destroy the Persian threat to Greece, he devoutly worshipped at Achilles’ tomb. 2,200 years later everyone thought Troy was a pure myth – all historians certainly did – except for a self-made German businessman named Heinrich Schliemann. He spent his fortune excavating a mound called Hissarlik in 1871 – and found Troy.

Today, you can explore these ruins of history yourself. Go there alone at night with a full moon above. Will the shade of Achilles come forth out of the moonlit shadows to greet you? (Glimpses of Our Breathtaking World #217 photo ©Jack Wheeler)

The oldest part of the Silk Road was originally called the Jade Road along the string of oases watered by runoff from the Kunlun mountains of northern Tibet on the southern edge of the Takla Makan desert in Chinese Turkestan. This is where the finest jade was to be found, washed down from Tibet. This is the route that Marco Polo took with his father and uncle in 1272 to reach the court of the Mongol Emperor Kublai Khan.

This is what the Jade Road looks like today, near the fabled oasis of Khotan. Save for the road being asphalted and the farmer’s cart being towed by a small tractor instead of a donkey, Polo would recognize it. (Glimpses of Our Breathtaking World #179 photo ©Jack Wheeler)

This is the ruins of the Castle of St. Hilarion in Northern Cyprus. In 1191, the Byzantine ruler of Cyprus made the mistake of capturing a ship carrying Princess Berengaria of Navarre and held her hostage. She was the fiancée of England’s King Richard the Lion-Heart. You don’t do that to a guy nicknamed Lion-Heart.

Richard proceeded to conquer the whole island and turned it over to a group of French Catholic knights led by Guy de Lusignan. The knights built a series of fortified castles around the island to ward off the Moslem "Saracens." The most spectacular was atop a vertiginous crag high above the port of Kyrenia named after a crazy hermit who lived near there whom the knights dubbed St. Hilarion.

When Walt Disney was making his classic Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs in 1937, he chanced upon pictures of St. Hilarion’s Castle, which his imagination transformed into the fairy tale castle of the movie. Can you see how he got the idea?

In the castle museum, there’s an explanation with some of Disney’s original sketches based on St. Hilarion’s. Disney was an imaginative genius. (Glimpses of Our Breathtaking World #139 Photo ©Jack Wheeler)