The Kayan tribal people live in a remote roadless valley in the Shan Hills of Burma.  Kayan women practice their tradition of beauty starting at age five.  The young girls have a few brass coils placed around their necks, adding to them progressively as they grow until in older adulthood they are wearing as many as two dozen – becoming what the world knows them as Giraffe women.  (The Shan people call them "Padaung" meaning "long-necked," but they call themselves Kayan.)

We are not here to gawk.  We are here to make friends, treat them respectfully, and learn about their traditions.  It is an intensely memorable experience to meet these ladies.  We’ll be here again in early March next year. (Glimpses of Our Breathtaking World #58 photo ©Jack Wheeler)

The Wodaabe are cattle-herding nomads in Niger, West Africa.  Their Gerewol festival features Yaake dances by the men to impress marriageable ladies with how ideally handsome they are.  Those ideals include being tall and athletic, having white eyes and white teeth, decorating themselves colorfully, and having a winning smile.

The Wodaabe are a fun-loving, friendly, and hospitable people.  You’ll meet them on our Trans-Sahara Expedition when we’re next able to operate one.  (Glimpses of Our Breathtaking World #57 Photo ©Jack Wheeler)

Bram Stoker’s 1897 novel “Dracula” described Count Dracula’s home as a castle located high above a gorge perched on a rock in Transylvania’s Carpathian Mountains.  And here you are, Bran Castle, built in the late 1300s near the town of Brasov in Romania, and traditionally associated with Vlad Dracula (1428-1477).

His father, Vlad Dracul (Vlad the Dragon), as the ruler of Wallachia (southern Romania), led Christian knights fighting Ottoman Turks called the Order of the Dragon, or “Dracul” in Romanian.   His son succeeded him as Dracula – “son of the dragon” – waging war upon the Moslem Ottomans so brutally he became known as “Vlad the Impaler” for impaling his enemies.  They began spreading rumors of his being literally bloodthirsty, drinking his enemies’ blood.

Over the centuries since, Vlad Dracula has been celebrated by Romanians as their national hero in his liberation struggle from the Ottomans.  But was Bran Castle his home?  He had many homes, and was here many times during his campaigns.  Visiting Dracula’s Castle is always a highlight of our explorations of Eastern Europe. (Glimpses of Our Breathtaking World #56 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)   

Princess Iparhan, granddaughter of the ruler of the Silk Road oasis of Kashgar, was so famous for her beauty and the intoxicating natural aroma of her body that the Manchu Emperor far to the east called for her.  She was 22, the year was 1756.  The Emperor became completely infatuated with her, making Iparhan his Imperial Noble Consort, loving her deeply until her death 33 years later in 1789.

In mourning, the Emperor kept his promise to her that her body would be returned to Kashgar and buried in the mausoleum of Apak Hoja, built in 1640 by her Apaki family.  And there she rests today.  Everyone in Kashgar and beyond, however, knows the mausoleum as The Tomb of the Fragrant Concubine.

It’s a wonderfully romantic legend, and even though there are several conflicting versions, let’s hope this one is true.  Regardless, a visit to this peaceful shrine is certainly memorable.  (Glimpses of Our Breathtaking World #54 Photo ©Jack Wheeler)

The high hidden Valley of Shing in western Tajikistan holds, as we learned in yesterday’s Glimpse #52, a series of seven stepping-stone lakes called the Seven Pearls of Shing.  The valley is dotted with tiny villages of Mountain Tajiks, descendants of the ancient Sogdians who fought Alexander the Great.

Alexander fell in love with and married a Sogdian princess named Roxanna – and the girls of Shing are often named Roxanna to this day.  The Mountain Tajiks of the Shing are a special people – strong, independent and free.  They are also warm and welcoming.  The kids – the girls just like the boys – grow up vibrant and confidant.  These two young brothers exemplify that.

Each of the seven pearls have a unique breathless beauty, for they are of different colors and change according to the time of day.  We are here at Mijnon (Eyelash), the first pearl, followed by Soya (Shade), Hushnor (Vigilance), Nophin (Navel), Khurdak (Little One), Marguzor (Blossoming), and Hazor Chasma (Thousand Springs).  Towering above us are snow-laced mountains 18,000 feet high.

Perhaps you’d like to join your fellow TTPers to make the Seven Pearls, and so much else, a part of your life next May?  Let me know! (Glimpses of Our Breathtaking World #53 photo ©Jack Wheeler)  

There is a series of stepping-stone lakes in a hidden valley in Tajikistan known as The Seven Pearls of Shing.  This is the fourth, taken at dawn’s early light with the lake a mirror reflecting the sky and surrounding mountains.  Each Pearl are of different colors, each of uniquely mesmerizing allure. It is one of the many wonders – natural, cultural, historical – we’ll experience next May in our exploration of all Five Stans of Hidden Central Asia. (Glimpses of Our Breathtaking World #52 Photo ©Jack Wheeler)

At the foot of Mount Hermon in northern Israel you find the Grotto of Pan, the Greek God of Nature, where pilgrims came from all over the ancient world to worship.  Remnants of the huge Temple of Pan are here, together with the cave grotto where he lived when not at Olympus.  The spring that gushes forth from the grotto is one of the sources of the Jordan River.

If Pan was ever disturbed, he would groan so loudly it would cause anyone who heard it to “panic” (panikos in Greek) – the origin of the term.  Loudest of all was his last.  The legend is that with the advent of Christianity replacing belief in the Olympian Gods, Pan died for lack of worshippers, emitting a death groan of agony from the mouth of the cave you see here so loud and terrifying it was heard throughout the Mediterranean.  It’s a beautiful and peaceful place today. (Glimpses of Our Breathtaking World #51 photo ©Jack Wheeler)

April 1990.  When our oldest son Brandon was six years old, I took him with me to the North Pole.  It was my 14th expedition there, and as always, we stopped to visit friends at Canada’s northernmost community, the Inuit hunting village of Grise Fiord on Ellesmere Island.  Brandon thought it would be cool to sleep in an igloo, which the Inuit do only when they’re hunting seals or walrus far out on the ice.

So the villagers happily complied, showing him how they built one, carving out blocks of wind-blown snow, shaping and placing them in an inward-sloped spiral with one block on top, and packing snow as mortar between the blocks. When it was bedtime – still daylight with 24-hour sunshine by April – they lined the inside with caribou skins, which shed like crazy with hairs everywhere but sure are warm.  Snuggled into our arctic down sleeping bags, we slept like stones.

It was an experience both of us will never forget.  Never pass up an opportunity to have an adventure with your kids they’ll always remember.  (Glimpses of Our Breathtaking World #50 Photo ©Jack Wheeler)

East of Borneo in Indonesia is a large starfish-shaped Island called Sulawesi, where in the south-central mountains the Toraja people have created one of the most exotic cultures on earth.  They bury their dead in caves carved out of vertical cliffs, with balconies at the entrances lined with clothed wooden effigies called a Tau Tau as guardians for the departed.

The Toraja live in villages composed of family long houses with enormous peaked roofs of wood and thatch, decorated with exquisite painted art and scores of buffalo horns.  While Indonesia is predominantly Moslem, the Toraja are a blend of Christian-animist.  They are a gentle, peaceful people, marvelously welcoming and friendly.  It is a priceless privilege to spend time with them, as I was able to during the summer of 2016. (Glimpses of Our Breathtaking World #49 Photo ©Jack Wheeler)

Have you ever seen the ocean turn day-glo pink?  It does here naturally during a sunset (this is not photoshopped).  Between Samoa and Tonga in the South Pacific is a raised coral atoll, 100 square miles of old limestone between 60 and 200 feet high:  the island of Niue (new-way), and it’s is uniquely fabulous.

With no silty river runoff, the water is incredibly clear – visibility can reach over 200 feet.  There are a multitude of chasms through which you clamber to these out-of-a-movie tidal pools perfect for snorkeling surrounded by colorful reef fish.  The limestone cliffs encircling the coast are riddled with caves with multi-colored stalactites and stalagmites.

You can snorkel or dive with spinner dolphins and humpback whales.  The big game fishing is world class – within a few hundred yards off shore.  The Niueans are unfailingly friendly and welcoming, the beautiful Matavai Resort is the best bargain in the Pacific, the food and beer is inexpensive, the weather is balmy.  It’s a Polynesian  paradise you never heard of. (Glimpses of Our Breathtaking World #48 Photo ©Jack Wheeler)

Many consider this the most surrealistic place on earth.  The clarity of the air turns the sky deep cobalt blue, the dunes are so old they’ve rusted red, combining with the white clay floor to give the skeletal trees a scene out of a Dali painting or a science fiction movie.  But it’s real.

A thousand years ago the river watering these trees dried up, leaving a white clay pan amidst red sand dunes almost as tall as the Empire State Building.  It’s so dry here these acacia trees can’t decompose, their skeletons standing scorched in the sun for ten centuries.

Dead Vlei is in a region of enormous dunes called Sossusvlei.  It’s a mind-boggling experience to float over Sossusvlei in a hot air balloon.  Namibia, in fact, is full of such experiences – the largest fur seal colony anywhere at Cape Cross, the marvelous abundance of African wildlife at the Etosha Pan, the dramatic shipwrecks dotting the Skeleton Coast, traditional people living untouched by the modern world like the Himbas.

Plus it’s one of the safest and best-run countries in all Africa – certainly worth consideration for your bucket list. (Glimpses of Our Breathtaking World #47 photo ©Jack Wheeler)    

Jamestown on Saint Helena in the South Atlantic is two blocks wide and a mile long in a narrow deep ravine.  One of the world’s longest straight staircases, Jacob’s Ladder, was an original way to get out – 699 steps each 11 inches high – and it’s a workout.

People who live here call themselves “Saints” and pronounce their island “sent-uhl-LEEN-ah.”  It’s famous of course for where the Brits exiled Napoleon after Waterloo.  His residence and gardens on a high promontory, Longwood House, is preserved with original furnishings and his death bed.  Dying in 1821, he was buried in a beautiful peaceful glen nearby (in 1840 he was reinterred at Les Invalides in Paris).

After climbing the Ladder and visiting Longwood, you’d want to refresh yourself at one of Jamestown’s pubs, where local Saints will be happy to hoist a pint with you.  And don’t pass up a visit to the Saint Helena Distillery, the world’s remotest distillery, to learn how Head Distiller Paul Hickling makes his memorable Prickly Pear Whiskey, White Lion Spiced Rum, and Jamestown Gin – all in unique stepping stone bottles in honor of Jacob’s Ladder. (Glimpses of Our Breathtaking World #46 Photo ©Jack Wheeler)

August, 1971.  Here is where the Ancient Greeks believed their 12 Olympian Gods lived, on the summit of the highest peak of Olympus – Mytikas at 9,571ft/2,918m. There are 52 jagged prominences of Olympus, but if you want to commune with Zeus, Apollo, Aphrodite, Athena and the rest, this is where you go.

It takes just two days: morning drive from Athens (4 hrs) to Litochoro, then the roadhead at Priona (2,500ft).  Afternoon hike of some 3 hours through pretty pine forests to the comfortable Spilios Agapitos refuge (6,700ft) for dinner and a bunk bed overnight.  You’re up at dawn for a strenuous but not technical climb up to Skala peak at 9,400ft.  In my photo, you’re looking at Mytikas from Skala.  It’s a Class B rock scramble – no ropes or gear, but this shouldn’t be your first mountain rodeo. Be careful!

I was by myself at the Mytikas summit and no selfies in those days, so I said my greetings to the gods, and I was back down at the refuge by lunchtime.  You’ll be back at the Plaka below the Acropolis in Athens for ouzo and dinner. (Glimpses of Our Breathtaking World #45 photo ©Jack Wheeler)

We camped here overnight in May a year ago crossing Turkmenistan’s Kara Kum (Black Sand) Desert, and we’ll be here again in May next year.  The Darvaz Gas Crater – known to locals as “The Door to Hell” – has been burning nonstop since 1971, when Russian engineers set it on fire expecting it to burn off and it never has. This is a night -- and a sight -- you’ll never ever forget.  My son Brandon can vouch for that! (Glimpses of Our Breathtaking World #44 Photo ©Jack Wheeler)

You’ve seen this spooky place called King’s Road in HBO’s The Games of Thrones – but where is it and what is it really?  It’s in Country Antrim in Northern Ireland near the town of Armoy.  Originally it was the driveway to a mansion built in 1775 by James Stuart, descendant of King James I of England (1566-1625), who lined either side with beech trees.  Now almost 250 years old, their branches intertwine eerily, giving rise to its name of “Dark Hedges,” and legends of ghosts haunting it like the “Grey Lady.”

Northern Ireland has had its terrible Troubles as we all know, but that’s history now.  It’s a place of stunning scenery and natural wonders like the Devil’s Causeway and Marble Arch Caves, and those man-made in addition to Dark Hedges, such as Dunluce Castle and Carrick-a-Rede Rope Bridge.  Then there’s the Victorian opulence of the Crown Liquor Saloon in Belfast.  All in all, Northern Ireland is a marvelous place to visit. (Glimpses of Our Breathtaking World #43 photo ©Jack Wheeler)

That would be Tristan da Cunha in the middle of the South Atlantic Ocean.  Some 260 Tristanians live here, all British citizens as the island is a UK Territory, in the island’s only community of Edinburgh-of-the-Seven-Seas.  There’s no way to fly here – you have to take a boat for at least a week from Cape Town (and then a week back).

Tristanians are among the world’s most special people.  Since the island was first settled in 1810, there has never been a single murder, abortion, or divorce among them.  They are at peace with themselves, unfailingly cheerful, hospitable, and contented.    If you are lucky enough to reach here, you may not want to ever leave. (Glimpses of Our Breathtaking World #42 Photo ©Jack Wheeler)

West of the Himalayan giants of Annapurna and Dhaulagiri in Nepal lies a roadless high wilderness inhabited only by Tibetan nomads called Dolpa.  The region is named after them, Dolpo.  The Dolpa practice the ancient pre-Buddhist animist religion of Tibet called Bön.  They worship sites of nature they consider holy.  And holiest of all is the Sacred Lake of Phoksundo.

The Dolpa consider the blue of Phoksundo an act of magic by the gods.  Once you see it, you can only agree.  This picture is not photoshopped – it is real. We visit it in late October when it is ice free on our Himalaya Helicopter Expeditions. (Glimpses of Our Breathtaking World #41 Photo ©Jack Wheeler)

November 17, 1976.  When I wrote my book “The Adventurer’s Guide,” it was a fantasy of mine to go on the Tonight Show and have Johnny Carson hold a “tsantsa,” a human shrunken head – as a book chapter was “How To Live With Headhunters.”  As you can see, that fantasy came true.  I still can’t believe how relaxed I was in the studio photo.  That’s because Carson had a magical ability to put a guest like me, no professional performer, at ease.  The cameras and lights, the audience, millions watching on TV all went away.  It was just me talking to this friendly fellow with no one around.  An amazing experience.  Some dreams can really happen!  (Glimpses of Our Breathtaking World #40 photo ©Jack Wheeler)

The Salar de Uyuni, 12,000 feet high in the Altiplano of Bolivia, is a 4,000 square mile expanse of salt so flat it is used to calibrate the altimeters of NASA observation satellites of the earth.  After a rain, it becomes the world’s largest mirror, 80 miles across.  The incredible reflective surface extends to the horizon in every direction – it is both hallucinatingly disorienting and makes for amazing mirror-to-horizon photos (especially at sunrise/sunset).

The brine underneath the salt crust contains 70% of the world’s lithium – critical to our battery-fueled global economy – produced in evaporation pools that are a kaleidoscope of colors.

You can stay here in relative luxury at one of the world’s most unique hotels – the Palacio de Sal, built entirely of salt: walls, floors, ceilings, furniture, sculptures.  Being here is one of South America’s more astounding experiences.  Let me know if you want a Wheeler Expedition to take you there! (Glimpses of Our Breathtaking World #39 Photo ©Jack Wheeler)

This is the North Face of Mount Kailas (6,638 m/21,778 ft) in a remote region of far western Tibet inhabited only by Changpa nomads.  For 22% of all people on Earth – 1.2 billion Hindus, 510 million Buddhists and many millions of others – it is the spiritual Center of the Universe, the Navel of All Creation.

Kailas and surrounding glaciers are considered the source of four of Asia’s great rivers radiating out from it: the Indus, Tsangpo-Bhramaputra, Sutlej, and Karnali-Ganges. As a sacred mountain it has never been climbed.

For thousands of years, people from all Asia have made the arduous pilgrimage to Kailas to perform the sacred act of circumambulating around the mountain – most clockwise, counterclockwise for others such as the Changpa adhering to the ancient Bön Tibetan religion.

It is not easy.  Huffing over the high point of the pilgrimage route with TTPer Big John Perrot, our altimeter said we were as high as Kilimanjaro, over 19,000 feet.  The highlight, however, is being among so many pilgrims from so many diverse cultures.  This is one of our world’s thrilling adventures, and such a privilege to participate in. (Glimpses of Our Breathtaking World #38 Photo ©Jack Wheeler)

The 5th highest mountain on earth at 8,463 meters/27,765ft, Makalu is Sanskrit for “Great Black” – a name for Shiva, the Hindu god of creative destruction, as here is one of his homes.  You’re looking face on the Southeast Ridge (the right side in sun, the left side in shade), which is the primary climbing route.

You’re seeing the entire south side of Makalu in Nepal, while the north side is in Tibet with the border running along the horizon crestline.  Makalu Base Camp lies below the bottom right corner of the photo.  This was taken at over 20,000 feet on our approach from Everest and Lhotse – 12 miles away – during our Himalaya Helicopter Expedition, or “HHE.”

Everyone is understandably entranced with Everest – yet the other 8,000 meter Himalayan giants are breathtakingly magnificent in their own right, and you can see why with Makalu.  On our HHE, we go to them all! (Glimpses of Our Breathtaking World #37 photo ©Jack Wheeler)

The ”Ark” was the palace-fortress of Bukhara rulers since 500 BC.  The ancient Silk Road oasis has a history of 5,000 years.  Today Bukhara is in Uzbekistan, one the Five Stans of Central Asia.  Each of the five – Uzbekistan, Kazakhstan, Kyrghizstan, Tajikistan, and Turkmenistan – are uniquely enchanting.  Together they comprise one of the most culturally, historically, and scenically spectacular, yet mysterious and unknown, regions on our Earth.  Let me know if you’d like to experience all five with me this coming May 2021. (Glimpses of Our Breathtaking World #36 Photo ©Jack Wheeler)

When my son Brandon turned 14, he asked me, “Dad, you climbed the Matterhorn at 14.  Could we climb the Matterhorn together now that I’m 14?”  It was 1998 and I was 54.  I didn’t think I could do it, but his request meant more than the world to me, so I agreed.  Each with our own bergführer guide, he breezed up, but it was a real struggle for me.

He made it, my guide didn’t think I could, so after summiting, Brandon came back down to get me.  We climbed the last 500 feet together.  Thus here we both are on the summit of the world’s most famous mountain.  There are no words to come close to expressing what this means to each of us. (Glimpses of Our Breathtaking World #35 photo ©Jack Wheeler)

This is the Dragon’s Blood Tree, Dracaena cinnabari. It can be found in only one place on earth, a remote island called a Lost World for its uniqueness, the “most alien-looking place on our planet.”

Although it’s known as the most alien, strangest, weirdest, and bizarre place you can go to, it’s also completely safe and incredibly beautiful. Anybody who comes here returns saying, “You have to see it to believe it.” What is this place?

It’s the World Heritage Site of the island of Socotra, the “Galapagos of the Indian Ocean,” 240 miles off the coast of Yemen and now secured by the UAE. It’s hidden, remote, and far away.

We were there in 2014, and it’s been almost impossible to get to ever since.  But we’ll be back next April of 2021. Let me know if you’d like to be with us.  (Glimpses of Our Breathtaking World #34 Photo ©Jack Wheeler)

From the 900s to the 1200s, the Pagan Empire built over 10,000 Buddhist temples. 2,200 remain on the plains of Pagan today, one of the world’s most wondrous sights – especially if you see them from above in a hot air balloon.  It is truly astounding how much there is to explore and experience in Burma.  We’ll be there once more for it all next February.  I hope you will be one of your fellow TTPers to join us. (Glimpses of Our Breathtaking World #33 photo ©Jack Wheeler)

The southernmost portion of the Gobi Desert is called the Alashan in Inner Mongolia. Traversed by Marco Polo in 1273 on his way to meet the Mongol Emperor Kublai Khan, he said it contained a “mystery.”

For in the hidden center of the Alashan is an area known as Badain Jaran, “Mystery Lakes” in Mongolian.  There are some 140 of these small lakes surrounded by enormous sand dunes.  The photo you see is of one of these lakes, taken in late afternoon on a windless day, with the giant dunes above reflected on the water.

We were there in October 2017.  We will explore Inner Mongolia and the Gobi again in October 2021. (Glimpses of Our Breathtaking World #32 Photo ©Jack Wheeler)