“A snapshot from mountaineer's life”. Have you ever wondered how does a mountaineer's day start? I will give you a hint: you wake up at 3 am, set the stove, wake up your partner, pretend it is warm, quickly consume a high-calorie breakfast, watch your friends slowly ascending the icy slopes of your dream summit with their tiny head torches glimmering against perfectly blue ice, and hope for the good weather. One would ask: why all this trouble? The answer is easy: for the love of the adventure and the unknown. Location: Chamonix, Haute Savoye, France. (Photo and caption by Kamil Tamiola/National Geographic Traveler Photo Contest)

ATTENTION! All pictures are presented in high resolution. To see Hi-Res images – just TWICE click on any picture. In other words, click small picture – opens the BIG picture. Click BIG picture – opens VERY BIG picture.

“Attacking Howler Monkey”. Due to a major tropical rainstorm my wife and I were forced to stay overnight in a Howler Monkey Rescue center in Panama. I used the time to explore the area and to take photos of the monkeys. Just after the rain finally stopped, I ran into this monkey that tried to mock attack me. I quickly took a couple of photos before retreating to a (more) safe distance. (Photo and caption by Christian Mueller-Planitz/National Geographic Traveler Photo Contest)

ATTENTION! All pictures are presented in high resolution. To see Hi-Res images – just TWICE click on any picture. In other words, click small picture – opens the BIG picture. Click BIG picture – opens VERY BIG picture.

“Super Enerji”. Taken on my road trip through Turkey. (Photo and caption by Michelle Brandemuehl/National Geographic Traveler Photo Contest)

ATTENTION! All pictures are presented in high resolution. To see Hi-Res images – just TWICE click on any picture. In other words, click small picture – opens the BIG picture. Click BIG picture – opens VERY BIG picture.

Igor Shpilenok works in the reserve at Kamchatka, Russia. Igor is a fellow of the International League of Conservation Photographers and a winner of the 2006 BBC Wildlife Photographer Competition. Igor’s work has been published in numerous international and Russian magazines, including Smithsonian, National Wildlife, Geo, and BBC Wildlife.

“How does a bear behave when encounter a human? In most cases he runs away. But before running he almost always would rise to stand on his rear feet. And this behavior does not indicate the attack, as many people think...” – Igor Shpilenok. (Photo by Igor Shpilenok via Wildlife Photo Russia)

Women holding the Singapore national flag pose for a photograph at the Merlion Park to mark the 55th National Day celebrations in Singapore on August 9, 2020. National Day is celebrated in commemoration of Singapore's independence from Malaysia in 1965. (Photo by Roslan Rahman/AFP Photo)

Race goers enjoying Grand National Day at the Randox Grand National Festival at Aintree, Liverpool, Britain, 09 April 2022. This year's Grand National is the 174th edition of the legendary annual horse race at the Aintree Racecourse in Liverpool. (Photo by Peter Powell/EPA/EFE)

This February 7, 2018, photo shows João Lousada, a flight controller for the International Space Station, wearing an experimental space suit during a simulation of a future Mars mission in the Dhofar desert of southern Oman. The desolate desert in southern Oman resembles Mars so much that more than 200 scientists from 25 nations organized by the Austrian Space Forum are using it for the next four weeks to field-test technology for a manned mission to Mars. (Photo by Sam McNeil/AP Photo)

In this August 1, 2014 photo provided by the National Park Service are male caribou antlers in the Oolah Valley, likely the result of a grizzly kill as he migrated south for the winter at the Arctic National Park and Preserve in Alaska. The nation's northernmost national park says its new management plan will have to consider the effects of a new industrial road to the mining district of Ambler, the first road that would be constructed within its Maryland-sized boundaries. (Photo by Cadence Cook/AP Photo/National Park Service)