Second Place Winner: “Thunderstorm at False Kiva”. I hiked out to these ruins at night hoping to photograph them with the Milky Way, but instead a thunderstorm rolled through, creating this dramatic image. – Max Seigal. National Geographic Traveler Director of Photography Dan Westergren, one of this year's judges, shares his thoughts on the second place winner: “This photo combines two different scenes into one: the small kiva in a cliff dwelling and the grand vista of Canyonlands National Park across the valley. I really like the two different color palettes – warm inside and purple outside. This two-for-one scene was caused by the lightning storm outside the dwelling, which lit up the landscape like it was a huge electronic flash. Looking at this picture I can imagine what a wonderful sight it must have been for the ancient people who lived here. It doesn't seem too amazing now in our modern world, but might have been mind-blowing for the prehistoric residents”. Location: Utah. (Photo and caption by Max Seigal/National Geographic Traveler Photo Contest)

“We take rusty old junk and we put love into it”. The old Motor City has a unique style in bicycles these days: from fat wheels and fake fuel tanks to stretched cycles with powerful sound systems – and even a family-sized BBQ. “Detroit’s custom bike scene developed alongside Slow Roll, a weekly cycle ride started in 2010 by Jason Hall and Mike MacKool. Now upwards of 2,000 people turn up each Monday to cruise a different part of the city. The week I go the crowd seems evenly split between black and white, male and female, city and suburbs. It’s the most inclusive cycle event I’ve ever witnessed”. (Photo by Jason Walker/Slow Roll Monday Nights)

Tourists take photographs as a wild sika deer eats a bag on June 6, 2019 in Nara, Japan. Nara's free-roaming deer have become a huge attraction for tourists. However, an autopsy on a deer that was recently found dead near one of the city's famous temples discovered 3.2kg of plastic in its stomach and caused concern at the effect of tourism as Japan struggles to cope with a huge increase in domestic and international tourists. (Photo by Carl Court/Getty Images)

People enjoy the color run in Guangzhou, Guangdong province of China on May 29, 2022. (Photo by Stringer/Anadolu Agency via Getty Images)

Women labourers work at the construction site of a road in Kolkata January 8, 2015. Across towns and cities in India, it is not uncommon to see women cleaning building sites, carrying bricks and or shoveling gravel – helping construct the infrastructure necessary for the country's economic and social development. They help build roads, railway tracks, airports, and offices. They lay pipes for clean water supplies, cables for telecommunications, and dig the drains for sewage systems. But although women make up at least 20 percent of India's 40 million construction workers, they are less recognized than male workers with lower pay and often prone to safety hazards and sexual harassment. They are often unaware of their rights or scared to complain, say activists now trying to campaign for better treatment of women in the construction industry. (Photo by Rupak De Chowdhuri/Reuters)

On the Internet appeared the video, on which shows, according to the author of the video, as in the photos, which were taken by U.S. space probe MESSENGER (MErcury Surface, Space ENvironment, GEochemistry and Ranging), American automatic interplanetary station (AWS) for the study of Mercury, on the surface of Mercury has been found an unusual object... (Photo by NASA)

A little girl wearing a face mask dances in front of a toy panda at a shopping area in Shanghai, following the coronavirus disease (COVID-19) outbreak, China on June 16, 2020. (Photo by Aly Song/Reuters)

People in quarantine exercise in front of their homes amid Covid-19 full lockdown of the city in Shanghai, China, 27 April 2022. According to the Shanghai Health Commission on 27 April, there were 48 new Covid-19 deaths, 1,606 locally transmitted cases, and 11,956 local asymptomatic infections, in Shanghai city. Despite the death toll rising in Shanghai, the number of daily infections has gradually declined. (Photo by Alex Plavevski/EPA/EFE)