Merit Prize Winner: “A Well Earned Rest in the Sahara”. This photo of Moussa Macher, our Tuareg guide, was taken at the summit of Tin-Merzouga, the largest dune (or erg) in the Tadrat region of the Sahara desert in southern Algeria. Moussa rested while waiting for us to finish our 45-minute struggle to the top. It only took ten minutes of rolling, running, and jumping to get back down. The Tadrat is part of the Tassili N'Ajjer National Park World Heritage area, famous for its red sand and engravings and rock paintings of cattle, elephants, giraffes, and rhinos that lived there when the climate was milder. Photo location: Summit of Tin-Merzouga, Tadrat, Tassili N'Ajjer National Park, Algeria. (Photo and caption by Evan Cole/National Geographic Photo Contest)

A view of the construction site of the Chateau de Guedelon near Treigny in the Burgundy region of France, September 13, 2016. Blacksmiths, stonemasons and quarry men are hard at work in a Burgundy forest building a 13th-century-style castle using the most basic tools and materials, replicating the methods used hundreds of years ago to better understand them. (Photo by Jacky Naegelen/Reuters)

Fossilized whale bones are on display outside the Wati El Hitan Fossils and Climate Change Museum, a UNESCO natural World Heritage site, on the opening day, in the Fayoum oasis, Egypt, Thursday, January 14, 2016. Egypt has cut the ribbon on the Middle East's first fossil museum housing the world's largest intact skeleton of a "walking whale" in an attempt to attract much-needed tourists driven off by recent militant attacks. The construction of the much-hyped Fossils and Climate Change Museum was covered a 2 billion euros (2. 17 billion dollars) grant from Italy, according to Italian Ambassador Maurizio Massari. Its centerpiece is an intact, 37-million-year-old and 20-meter-long skeleton of a legged form of whale that testifies to how modern-day whales evolved from land mammals. The sand-colored, dome-shaped museum is barely discernible in the breathtaking desert landscape that stretches all around. (Photo by Thomas Hartwell/AP Photo)

Over the past three years, Los Angeles-based photographer Dotan Saguy has spent hundreds of hours documenting the diverse culture, people and pageantry of the iconic Venice Beach boardwalk. He was irresistibly drawn to the free-spirited, anti-materialistic and inclusive nature of the world-famous location, which he found to be a breath of fresh air in contrast to Los Angeles’s sometimes homogenized, celebrity-obsessed culture. (Photo by Dotan Saguy)

A Deer holding a leaf looks on as they roam Bridwell Park Estate on December 15, 2022 in Cullompton, England. The Devon estate is home to Lord Ivar Mountbatten, whose great uncle was Louis Mountbatten, 1st Earl Mountbatten of Burma. (Photo by Harry Trump/Getty Images)

Pusha the cat, which adopted four bereaved baby squirrels and currently feeds and lives with them, lies at a local park of miniatures in Bakhchisaray, Crimea on April 25, 2019. (Photo by Alexey Pavlishak/Reuters)

“Double head vulture”. On the day of windy days during raptors migration some people in my country start to catch these tired raptors, so in this day we go to photograph some raptors and we saw these tow tired vultures, so we start to drag them away from the hunters until they reach a good hidden place, to make them safe until they start a new journey. Photo location: Kuwait. (Photo and caption by Mohd Khorshed/National Geographic Photo Contest)

“Lofoten Glow”. I was desperately searching a good sunrise spot this particular morning. Normally Storvatnet Lake is completely covered in snow, so you can only imagine my surprise when I saw these crazy ice formations almost being shot out of the frozen lake. I put my crampons on and took a big risk walking out. I could hear the ice cracking underneath my feet, and when you’re all alone in a fjord/canyon like this – the cracks are echoed and sound really frightening. Was it worth it? I sure think so! Photo location: Storvatnet, Lofoten Islands in Northern Norway. (Photo and caption by Stian Klo/National Geographic Photo Contest)