Russian Developer Transforms Boeing 737 Jet into a Stunning Luxury Villa

Located atop a cliff on the Indonesian island of Bali, 150 meters above sea level, the stunning Private Jet Villa by Hanging Gardens is probably the world’s most beautifully converted Boeing 737 jet.

Converting retired airplanes isn’t new. We’ve seen them transformed into homes, restaurants, or even museums, but what developer Felix Demin managed to do with a Boeing 737 on the island of Bali is truly unprecedented. He managed to convert the giant aircraft into a luxurious two-bedroom villa perched atop a cliff overlooking the iconic Bali coastline. The project has been three years in the making, and involved several logistic challenges, from transporting the jet to its breathtaking location to the conversion itself. Luckily, Demin managed to overcome these hurdles and today, the Private Jet Villa by Hanging Gardens is one of the most sought-after accommodations on the Indonesian island, despite its steep nightly rates.

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This Italian Church Has a 500-Year-Old Crocodile Hanging from the Ceiling

The Santuario Della Beata Vergine Maria Delle Grazie, in Italy’s Lombardia region, is an old church famous for having a real taxidermied crocodile hanging from the ceiling.

What’s the last thing you expect to see when you look up in a church? Granted, there are plenty of interesting answers one can think of, but ‘a crocodile’ definitely ranks up there with the quirkiest of them. But if you travel to the small municipality of Curtatone, in Lombardia, Italy, you’ll find a church with a five-century-old crocodile hanging from the ceiling. It’s a peculiar sight, to say the least, but one that has been around for as long as anyone can remember. How the croc wound up at the Santuario Della Beata Vergine Maria Delle Grazie is, and will probably remain a mystery, but its purpose had been linked to religious symbolism.

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The World’s Largest Gashapon Store Is Home to More Than 3,000 Coin-Operated Machines

Tokyo’s Ikebukuro shopping district is home to the world’s largest gashapon capsule toy store – a 1,250m² area decked with over 3,000 gashapon machines filled with various figurines.

Gashapon machines have been a big part of Japan’s recreational culture for over half a decade, but while these toy capsule-filled machines are ubiquitous in the Asian country, the Mecca of gashapon machines is the Gashapon Official Store in Ikebukuro, Tokyo. It features over 3,000 coin-operated machines and probably millions of collectible toys and figurines. Using most of these machines requires a few hundred yen – from ¥200(~$1.33) to ¥500 (~$3.32) – but if you’re feeling generous, you can spin the wheel at the much more expensive ‘premium’ machines, which can cost up to ¥2,000 (~$13.27) on average for one random toy.

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Poll na bPéist – Ireland’s Naturally Rectangular Rock Pool

Inishmore, the largest of Ireland’s Aran Islands, is home to a remarkable natural wonder, a rectangular pool cut so straight into limestone that it looks man-made.

Also known as “The Wormhole” or “The Serpent’s Lair”, Poll na bPéist is a natural water basin with an edge length of approx. 10 by 25 meters within a stone formation. It can only be accessed by walking along the cliffs south of the ancient site Dún Aonghasa, but in recent years it has become famous for hosting the renowned Red Bull Cliff Diving World Series. The most fascinating thing about Poll na bPéist is its remarkable rectangular shape, which has led many to question its natural origins and sparked several theories, including that it is the work of an ancient civilization.

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Guiyang White House – China’s Largest And Most Mysterious Mansion?

The so-called ‘Guyiang White House’ is a gigantic structure located in the posh Huaguoyuan Wetland Park area of Guiyang City, in China’s Guizhou Province. It has gone viral as China’s largest mansion, but you can’t believe everything you read online…

Featuring an architectural style usually observed in European palaces and museums, the Guiyang White House has become one of the most iconic sights in the Chinese city of Guiyang. Although many have described it as ‘kitsch’, ‘over-the-top’, and overly opulent’, there is no denying the eye-catching appeal of this megalithic structure, both during the day and at night, when it is illuminated by countless light installations. The structure got its name because of its white exterior and Western architectural influences, but when it comes to size, it actually dwarfs its Washington namesake. The entire complex, including the artificial pond in front of the edifice, is said to cover an area of ​​18.3 million square meters.

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South Korea’s Majestic 860-year-Old Ginkgo Tree

Every year, in late autumn, thousands of people flock to Bangyeri, a village in Gyeongsang, South Korea, to witness the beauty of a majestic 860-year-old ginkgo biloba tree.

The secular Wonju Bangye-ri Ginkgo Tree is a national monument of South Korea famous for its impressive crown which currently covers a perimeter of around 17 meters. At around 32 meters tall (104ft), it is not even the Asian country’s tallest ginkgo tree, but the way its branches are spread out makes it one of the most visually impressive trees on Earth. In South Korea, the Bangye-ri Ginkgo Tree is often called the world’s most beautiful tree.

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Iran Mall – The World’s Largest Shopping Mall

The shopping mall is considered a symbol of American consumerism and the US is indeed home to over 100,000 shopping malls, but the title of world’s biggest shopping mall actually belongs to one of America’s biggest rivals, Iran.

Located northeast of Teheran, the humongous Iran Mall shopping mall covers an area of 31 square meters and consists of seven floors, but its entire infrastructure area measures a whopping 1.35 million square meters and is set to expand to 1.60 million square meters. Since 2014, over 1,200 contractors and around 25,000 workers worked around the clock to make the world’s largest shopping mall a reality. In 2018, the first phase of construction was completed, and 267,000 square meters of gross leasable area and 708 retail units were opened on 1 May 2018. That same year, Iran Mall set a Guinness record for the world’s longest continuous pour of concrete, with tons of concrete pouring continuously for 6 consecutive days.

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The World’s Largest Indoor Marine Science Park Looks Like an Alien Mothership

The Zhuhai Chimelong Marine Science Park in Zhuhai, China, is famous both for its impressive offering of rare marine wildlife from all over the world and its sci-fi-inspired design.

Announced in 2015, the Zhuhai Chimelong Marine Science Park immediately captured people’s imaginations with its futuristic design reminiscent of alien motherships depicted in sci-fi flicks and video games. Described as the largest indoor marine science park in the world, with more than 100,000 marine animals of around 300 species, as well as 100 kinds of living coral split into 10 themed areas. Originally scheduled to open in 2021, after ten years of planning and just over 5 years of actual construction, the giant marine science park only opened its gates to the public this month.

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Would You Pay $450 for a Unique Picnic Dangling 295 Feet Over a Thundering Waterfall?

A Brazilian adventure firm is offering thrillseekers the unique opportunity to enjoy a picnic at a wooden table suspended above the thundering Cascata da Sepultura, in the state of Rio Grande do Sul.

The breathtaking experience recently went viral thanks to a short clip posted by an American couple who found it while looking for special things to try in Brazil. In the video, Christianna Hurt and her rapper boyfriend ‘OnPointLikeOp’ can be seen casually enjoying some snacks and a glass of red wine at a picnic table suspended on a bunch of metal wires high above Cascata da Sepultura. The whole experience apparently lasts only 15 minutes and costs $450, but it’s definitely something you’ll never forget.

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This Shopping Mall Bathroom Has Been Dubbed the World’s Most Beautiful Public Bathroom

Tucked away on the sixth floor of a Nanjing shopping mall is one of the fanciest, most impressive public bathrooms in the world. To some, it is the world’s most beautiful public bathroom.

Designed by X+Living, a Shanghai-based architecture firm, the bathroom on the sixth floor of the Deji Plaza shopping mall in Nanjing, China makes you feel like you accidentally walked into a whimsical palace. That’s not usually the feeling you get from most public bathrooms… It starts out with a long corridor lined with plants coming out of the walls. This part of the bathroom was designed as “an immersive walk-through-a-garden experience”, but it’s hard to focus on the green decor with dozens of giant lamps shining on you from above, and with the light reflecting on the glossy floor.

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World’s Deepest Hotel Has You Sleeping 1,375 Feet Underground

Located in an abandoned mine, 419 meters under the mountains of Snowdonia in Wales, the ‘Deep Sleep’ hotel is the world’s deepest hotel.

Comprised of four private twin-bed cabins and a grotto room with a double bed, a dining area, and toilet facilities, Deep Sleep is a hotel unlike any other. Set deep within a section of the abandoned Cwmorthin slate mine, 1,375 feet (419 meters) underground, it is being advertised as the deepest hotel in the world. If that sounds like the kind of place you’d actually want to spend the night, know that you’ll not only have to pay up to £550 ($688) per night, and traverse a ‘steep and challenging’ route through the old mine shafts to reach it.

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This UK Farm Is Located in the Middle of a Motorway

Stott Hall Farm is the only farm in the world built right in the middle of a busy motorway, with crash barriers and a fence around it to keep livestock in and out-of-control vehicles out.

The M62 motorway connecting the cities of Liverpool and Hull in Northern England is famous for having an inhabited farm right in the middle of its roadways in Calderdale.  The unique farm is one of the ten best-known sights on the UK motorway network, and there are various stories and myths about its existence, the most popular of which claim that the motorway was split because the owners, Ken and Beth Wild, refused to sell. These stories would have you believe that Stott Hall Farm is essentially a ‘nail house’ the likes of which we’ve featured several times in the past. However, the reality of this infrastructural oddity is very different.

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Europe’s Highest Train Station Looks Like a Supervillain’s Secret Base

High up in the Swiss Alps, at an altitude of almost 3,500 meters (11,332 feet), lies Jungfraujoch, Europe’s highest train station, a wonder of human engineering that has been around for over a century.

The train doesn’t seem like the best means of transportation when trying to climb a mountain, but the Swiss would beg to differ, and they have proof to back up their claims. At the end of the 19th century, they began work on a project unlike any other – the Jungfraubahn, a steep railway through the Bernese Alps all the way to the ‘top of Europe’. And, at the end of the Jungfraubahn railway, they built Jungfraujoch, a spectacular train station perched on a rock between the Jungfrau and Mönch mountains, both of which soar over 4,000 meters. Today, Jungfraujoch is officially recognized as the highest train station in Europe and is one of Switzerland’s most popular tourist attractions.

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China’s Impressive ‘River Highway’ Lets Motorists Drive Through the Middle of a River

A mountainous river valley in China’s Hubei province is home to one of the Asian country’s most impressive pieces of infrastructure – a highway bridge that runs through the middle of a river.

Finalized in 2015, China’s ‘river highway’ is widely regarded as an infrastructural wonder.  Designed to link the town of Gufuzhen in Xingshan county to the main highway running between Shanghai and Chengdu in southwestern China, this unique suspended highway doesn’t make much sense at first glance. Why have a massive bridge built in the middle of the Xiangxi River, when you could just have it run alongside it, on land? In fact, there was already a road running along the river, which meant it could obviously be done, so why not build the highway that way? Well, apparently, Chinese engineers decided that a suspended highway running along the middle of the river was not only cheaper to build, but more efficient.

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The World’s Largest Department Store Is the Most Popular Tourist Attraction in Sweden

Covering an area as big as five football fields and selling over 100,000 products in 25 different departments, Gekås Ullared is not only the largest department store in the world, but Sweden’s most popular tourist attraction by a large margin.

Ullared, a small, unassuming town in the south of Sweden is home to about 800 people, according to the country’s most recent census. It’s really not the most beautiful place to visit in the Scandinavian country, and yet thousands of people from all over the world flock to Ullared every single day. It’s all because of Gekås Ullared the world-famous department store founded in 1963 by entrepreneur Göran Karlsson, which currently holds the record for the largest department store in the world. It has a total of 2,000 employees and can accommodate up to 5,500 shoppers at the same time.

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