Tourists play at a beach covered by a thick layer of green algae on July 3, 2013 in Qingdao, China. A large quantity of non-poisonous green seaweed, enteromorpha prolifera, hit the Qingdao coast in recent days. More than 20,000 tons of such seaweed has been removed from the city's beaches. (Photo by China Foto Press)

“Kumbh Mela is a mass Hindu pilgrimage in which Hindus gather at the Ganges river. The normal Kumbh Mela is celebrated every 3 years, the Ardh (half) Kumbh Mela is celebrated every six years at Haridwar and Prayag, the Purna (complete) Kumbh takes place every twelve years, at four places (Prayag (Allahabad), Haridwar, Ujjain, and Nashik). The Maha (great) Kumbh Mela which comes after 12 “Purna Kumbh Melas”, or 144 years, is held at Allahabad.

The last Ardh Kumbh Mela was held over a period of 45 days beginning in January 2007, more than 70 million Hindu pilgrims took part in the Ardh Kumbh Mela at Prayag, and on January 15, the most auspicious day of the festival of Makar Sankranti, more than 5 million participated. The previous Maha Kumbh Mela, held in 2001, was attended by around 60 million people, making it at the time the largest gathering anywhere in the world in recorded history”. – Wikipedia

Photo: Sadhus (holy men) smoke at their camp near the ritual site at Sangam, the confluence of the Ganges, Yamuna and mythical Saraswati rivers during the Ardh Kumbh Mela festival (Half Pitcher festival) January 18, 2007 in Allahabad, India. Millions of Hindu pilgrims have flocked to the largest religious gathering in the world which lasts for 45 days in northern India. The festival commemorates the mythical conflict between gods and demons over a pitcher filled with the “nectar of immortality”. Devotees believe that taking a holy dip in the Ganges at this time washes away their sins and paves the path to salvation. (Photo by Mario Tama/Getty Images)

Beautiful seascapes capture the “raw power” of waves rising and crashing in the Indian Ocean. The stunning photos were taken off the coast of Durban in South Africa, and show formations from above and below the surface. Surfer and photographer Marck Botha took the images between April and July, and has always had a passion for the ocean. Here: Marck captured this moment in time from the shore on July, 30, 2015, in Durban, South Africa. (Photo by Marck Botha/Barcroft Media)

A replica of the truck made from matchsticks by Janusz Urbanski is pictured at his flat in Ruda Slaska, Poland May 4, 2016. Janusz Urbanski has a one of a kind chessboard he never plays, a personalised guitar he does not strum and a boat he cannot sail. Why? They are all made from tens of thousands of matches. For the last 40 years, the former Polish miner and ironworker has harboured a passion to build replicas of objects, buildings and famous sites with just matchsticks and glue. (Photo by Kacper Pempel/Reuters)

Born with a rare condition, the artist has chronicled her life in portraits – capturing everything from her tattooed prosthetics to the tentacled creature she stitched together on the shores of Naoshima. Here: Ophelia (2013). From a series of photos of imagined women exhibited at the 2013 Aichi Triennale. Here, Katayama invokes Hamlet’s tragic heroine, after the painting by British pre-Raphaelite John Everett Millais. (Photo by Mari Katayama/The Guardian)

The Cotopaxi volcano, one of the world's highest active volcanoes, spews smoke as seen from El Pedregal, Ecuador, October 22, 2015. Ecuadorian authorities are monitoring activity at Cotopaxi volcano, which prompted Ecuador's President Rafael Correa to maintain a yellow alert for eruptions as bursts of ash keep spewing from the snow-encircled crater of the volcano and falling in gusts on residential communities. (Photo by Guillermo Granja/Reuters)

Residents wade through flood waters from Tropical Storm Harvey in Beaumont Place, Houston, Texas on August 28, 2017. Houston was still largely paralyzed Monday, and there was no relief in sight from the storm that spun into Texas as a Category 4 hurricane, then parked itself over the Gulf Coast. (Photo by Jonathan Bachman/Reuters)

Bulgarian Roma women from the close-knit Kalaidjii clan attend a so-called “bride fair” in a suburb of the city of Plovdiv April 13, 2015. Each year Roma families from the close-knit Kalaidjii clan gather during what they call a “bride fair”, an event offering parents a chance to meet and to arrange marriages for their children. (Photo by Stoyan Nenov/Reuters)