British Waters Wide Angle category runner-up. Grass snake swimming along a garden pond by Jack Perks (UK)in Nottinghamshire, UK. “I’m always on the lookout for unusual freshwater subjects and grass snakes are a species I’ve been after for years. I was told about a pond where the odd grass snake hangs around the lilly pads for frogs. I put my drysuit on and got into the water and could see one slithering along the surface. Slowly making my way towards it with my head only just poking above I got the spilt shot”. (Photo by Jack Perks/Underwater Photographer of the Year 2019)

NYC no pants subway ride. Thousands of straphangers took their pants off for the 15th annual "No Pants Subway Ride" hosted by Improv Everywhere. People gathered at seven meeting points throughout the five boroughs at 3PM. All participants met up at Union Square around 5PM to and had a pant-less celebration and the afterparty at Webster Hall. (Photo by Paul Martinka/The New York Post)

Travel photographer Amos Chapple recently crossed into Turkmenistan on a three-day transit visa and was able to photograph many of the sights and monuments in Ashgabat, the capital and largest city. Turkmenistan is a single-party country, a former Soviet state, run by a president at the center of a cult of personality.

Photo: A young couple leave the Alem Entertainment Center in Ashgabat. The current president has a history of breaking obscure records. In 2012 the wheel atop this complex was entered into the Guinness Book of World Records as the world's largest enclosed Ferris wheel. The structure was built at a cost of $90m. (Photo by Amos Chapple via The Atlantic)

“Stacked Supercell with Lightning”. This huge mesocyclone supercell was near the Nebraska / Kansas border on the night of June 22nd, 2012. What a stunning structure! (Photo and caption by Jennifer Brindley/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.

In this May 8, 2015 photo, sisters Zoraida Infante, left, and Graciela Trujillo pray on Fishermen's Beach before therapeutic swimming in the Pacific Ocean in Lima, Peru. Under overcast skies, the bathers practice thalassotherapy, which derives from the Greek “thalasso”, for “sea”, and draws on the ocean's healing properties. (Photo by Rodrigo Abd/AP Photo)

Boards stand lined up at the Rocinha Surf Association, ASR, headquarters at Rocinha slum in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, Thursday, July 2, 2015. ASR has given free lessons to over 2,000 children from Rio's shantytowns in the hopes of keeping the boys, who are mostly in their early teens and a few girls occupied by the sport and off the streets. (Photo by Felipe Dana/AP Photo)

Children eat watermelons to meet the “beginning of autumn” at a kindergarten in Handan, China on August 7, 2015. Chinese tradition to eat watermelons or peaches before that day symbolises “biting away summer”. The solar term ‘beginning of autumn’ falls on 8 August this year. (Photo by Xinhua/REX Shutterstock)

A chicken seller carries his chickens on his head in the market in Peshawar, Pakistan, August 20, 2015. (Photo by Khuram Parvez/Reuters)