Brave New Pictures

From the BNP archives:

We climbed 754 feet up Observation Hill to get the best perspective of McMurdo Station, the main U.S. research base located on the south tip of Ross Island, Antarctica, and our home for the next month. Off to the right in the distance is Mt. Erebus, the southern-most active volcano in the world. The wooden cross was erected in 1913 by a search party after Robert Falcon Scott and his team perished during their ill-fated Terra Nova expedition on the way back from the South Pole. The day we took this photo it was 48°F in Antarctica, but the very next afternoon a white-out blizzard blew in and brought sub-zero temperatures with it. This underscores the reason everyone who works at McMurdo is required to undergo survival training in one of the planets’ harshest environments.

From the BNP archives:

A few years ago we were shooting in locations throughout the United Kingdom and took a side trip to Stonehenge, about 90 miles outside of London. We were awestruck when this prehistoric monument suddenly appeared right off the road we’d been taking through rolling farmland. Stonehenge was built by a culture that left no written records, therefore how it was constructed and what it was used for remain the subjects of great debate. We arrived late in the afternoon with a storm rapidly blowing in, and were lucky enough to capture this image of the mammoth stones huddling together before night fell.

From the BNP archives:

The Sheikh Zayed Grand Mosque is located in Abu Dhabi, the capital city of the United Arab Emirates. It is the largest place of worship in the country and was built between 1996 – 2007 for a cost of $545 million. During religious festivals, the complex can accommodate more than 41,000 people. The Grand Mosque has seven chandeliers imported from Germany that incorporate millions of Swarovski crystals. As impressive as this building is, one thing we found fascinating is the world’s largest carpet, featured in the main hall, which weighs 35 tons and took 1,300 knotters two years to complete.

On assignment with Travel Quest

After 31 years we found ourselves finally back in Rome – The Eternal City. Here, the Pantheon stands as one of the architectural marvels of the world. We entered through the portico of large granite Corinthian columns just before noon and were greeted with this breathtaking sight. A shaft of angled light came through the central opening of the rotunda, or oculus, which was once considered the ‘connection between the temple and the gods above’. After witnessing the genius of the buildings’ design, it is difficult to argue with this theory. Almost 2,000 years after it was built, the Pantheon still boasts the world's largest unreinforced concrete dome with the height to the oculus and the diameter of the interior circle of the rotunda being the same – 142 ft. It is truly something to behold!