"Tucked behind an unassuming yellow landscape, the rainbow of Artists Palette is the highlight along the Artists Drive Scenic Loop. Here, visitors marvel at an array of colors (red, orange, yellow, blue, pink, and green), splashed across the hills. These colors are from volcanic deposits rich in compounds such as iron oxides and chlorite, which creates a rainbow effect ... When visiting Artists Palette, allow approximately 30 minutes to detour from Badwater Road along the one-way Artists Drive Scenic Loop. The drive begins 8.5 miles (13.7 km) south of the Hwy 190/Badwater Rd.

This rollercoaster of a 2.5 mile (4 km) gravel road will take you through "colorful, eroded badlands" and parts of where scenes from "Star Wars VI: Return Of The Jedi" was filmed. Located just east of Zabriskie Point off of CA-190, "the road is usually fine for most cars, those with especally low clearance are not recommended. Check with a ranger for current conditions."

“The source of Badwater’s salts is Death Valley’s drainage system of 9,000 square miles—an area larger than New Hampshire. Rain falling on distant peaks creates floods that rush ever lower. Along the way, minerals dissolve from rocks and join the flood. Here, at the lowest elevation, floods come to rest, forming temporary lakes. As the water evaporates, minerals concentrate until only the salts remain. After thousands of years, enough salts have washed in to produce layer upon layer of salt crust.”

Zabriskie Point, "named after Christian Brevoort Zabriskie, vice president and general manager of the Pacific Coast Borax Company in the early 20th century, which had its mining operations in Death Valley," is an iconic location for watching (and photographing) sunrise, sunset, and night skies.

While "thunder bumpers" make for starkly beautiful images, dark storm clouds in the distance are not to be taken lightly in Death Valley National Park. Thunderous rainstorms blowing debris across the road and flash floods can ruin a good trip pretty quickly. The Traveler wrote about the August 2022 flood in this national park.

These red-footed boobies sure are colorful! Seems that most of the wildlife at Galapagos National Park is colorful in some way. With this bird, it's the feet *and* the beak. The males like to show off their snazzy red "shoes" to the ladies during mating season. Red-footed boobies nest in trees rather than on the ground like other booby species, which actually provides good protection since these guys are the smallest of the six booby species. Oh, and they only nest in the full sun and not in shaded areas.

"April showers bring May flowers," is more important than you might think when it comes to blooming cactus in an arid environment such as Big Bend National Park. There are more than 60 species of cactus which begin blooming in late March on into the summer. You can read about these "desert treasurs" by clicking here.

This little hummingbird was happily sipping nectar from the flowers at the Great Basin National Park visitor center. "Many types of birds can be found in Great Basin National Park and the surrounding area. A large variety of birds can be seen in the many different habitats encountered between the town of Baker (5,280 feet elevation) and the end of the Scenic Drive (10,000 feet elevation). Many birds such as the Common Raven, Northern Flicker and the American Robin, can be found in more than one type of habitat."

Wow, talk about eye-popping colors on this crab! According to galapagosconservation.org.uk, Sally Lightfoot crabs are "found in the Galapagos Islands and across the western coast of South and Central America.

"People first arrived in the Chesapeake Bay during the last ice age. As glaciers melted, diverse societies learned to thrive in a world of water. When Englishman Captain John Smith explored the Bay in 1608, he documented hundreds of American Indian communities. Today, sites on his map are archeological treasures and sacred sites for tribal citizens."