“Touring the Koko-en Gardens adjacent to the Himeji castle was an unexpected highlight of our visit”, wrote Jeff Solar, 64, of Silver Spring, Md., about his trip to Japan. “The fall colors were outstanding and the gardens were both amazing and a bargain (just a few Yen added to the cost of the Himeji Castle admission)”. (Photo by Jeff Solar/2017 Washington Post Travel Photo Contest)

A mother raise her glass filled with 2017 Beaujolais Nouveau wine as she holds her child in a colored hot water “wine bath” at Hakone Kowakien Yunessun hot spring resort in Hakone, west of Tokyo, Japan, 16 November 2017, on the day of the Beaujolais Nouveau official release. With Germany and the United States, Japan is a major market for the Beaujolais Nouveau. (Photo by Franck Robichon/EPA/EFE)

Picture shows a mural painting in Ferrol, on September 2, 2018, during the annual street art festival “Meninas de Canido” set up in 2008 to breathe new life in a dying neighborhood. Angry at the announced death of his neighborhood, Canido, in Ferrol, Eduardo Hermida painted his version of Velazquez's “Meninas” on a wall. An act of protest that gave birth to a festival and gave new colors to this city of Galicia. (Photo by Miguel Riopa/AFP Photo)

A toque macaque is eating flowers in the water at the pilgrimage site in Polonnaruwa, Sri Lanka, on January 13, 2024. The toque macaque (Macaca sinica), a reddish-brown-colored Old World monkey, is endemic to Sri Lanka, where it is known as the rilewa or rilawa. It is named for the whorl of hair at the crown of its head, which resembles a brimless toque cap. (Photo by Thilina Kaluthotage/NurPhoto/Rex Features/Shutterstock)

A pheasant is seen among grasses in Bursa, Turkiye on October 07, 2024. Pheasants mostly live in forested areas, thickets and wetlands. Unlike females, male pheasants have a much more remarkable structure with their long tails and feathers in bright and variable colors. Also, they feed on fruits, grains, seeds and invertebrates. (Photo by Alper Tuydes/Anadolu via Getty Images)

Well, this is hardly a waist of time! Here’s the couple who traveled the U.S. with an LED hula hoop – taking magnificent landscape photographs as they went. The brilliantly vibrant photographs show off the lights and colors of the lit-up hula hoop – with the strikingly serene American landscapes in the background. Grant Mallory, 25, from Columbus, Ohio, took pictures of his 23-year-old fiance hula-hooping in various national parks across the United States over the course of a three month road trip in the summer of 2015. Here: Magnificent pictures taken by Grant Mallory. (Photo by Grant Mallory/Caters News)

The combination of two different drawing styles in one picture never ceases to amaze us. The works of Allison Kunath are a vivid example of this technique. The background of her pictures is drawn using watercolors, while the actual image is broken down into rough geometrical shapes. This creates a very striking contrast, thanks to black, bold lines of the image on the forefront drawn over soft, cloudy shades of color. The skill of Allison is clearly seen in the way she manages to draw something as amorphous as a squid without making any curved lines. (Photo by Allison Kunath)

Some people joke about having clowns at their funeral, but how about having a coffin that looks like a gigantic cellphone? It is impossible to tell at the first glance that these colorful sculptures are actually coffins. The coffins were made by Kane Kwei and his assistant Paa Joe more than twenty years ago and have been a somewhat grim tourist attraction ever since. These coffins were probably made as an advertisement for the actual business, since it would hard to imagine someone actually ordering a coffin such as this.