In Zanzibar, a historic 19th-century palace is a reminder of the world's shortest war.

The culture that built these Tanzanian ruins displayed advanced knowledge of irrigation technology before mysteriously disappearing.

These strange piles of magnetized volcanic ash travel across the desert about 50 feet per year.

This sacred, circular cave is lined with pools so clear and still that it's hard to tell where the water begins.

The largest game reserve in Africa is home to thousands of species but refuses to house humans.

Stunning ruins of what was once the center of one of the greatest empires in East Africa.

These Nubian pyramids are strange and unique, even by pyramid standards.

Remains of an abandoned coral city.

A British general, a suggestive tree, a map of paradise.

One of the oldest restaurants in the Seychelles.

Despite a fraught and controversial history this African island holds a powerful monument to the tragedy of the slave trade.

A tree seems to grow from the ocean floor on this strange strip of sand slowly being overtaken by the sea.

This deceptively salty lake looks like blushing pink lemonade.

Nature’s skyscraper launches out of the terrain with attitude.

This abandoned plantation was once witness to an eclipse that proved Einstein's theory of relativity.

The last remaining site of Yoruba worship of the fertility goddess.

Bizarre living fossil only grows in a small chunk of the Namib Desert.

Far from the shore, this sandy victim of the Skeleton Coast looks like it was plopped in the middle of the desert.

Ancient artists in the middle of nowhere.

This "dead marsh" sits among the largest sand dunes in the world, a forest frozen in time.

A desert that rolls right up to the ocean, where it's so dry animals live off the fog.

The remains of diamond fever taken over by the desert.

From neon green watering holes to bleached elephant foetuses, this Mozambique museum makes natural history weird.

When humans abandoned this safari lodge, the lions took over.