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Find out right now what exactly is lava-bread + 11 bizarre facts National Geographic Shared With Us! What lies beneath Greenland ice and also check out the mystery of a man who built a stone castle using the secret of the Pyramids
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00:00The year is 1923. Two teenagers sneak out of their homes in the middle of the night in Florida City.
00:07Rumor had it that an old man was building a rock castle by himself.
00:11But every time someone tried to see what the old man was doing, he would stop working.
00:16The curious teens managed to sneak into Ed's backyard and saw something they could later
00:22describe as magic. They recalled seeing rocks moving around like helium balloons.
00:28The old man was moving up to 30 tons of stone by himself to build his castle.
00:34Even if he didn't allow anyone to see him working, he would proudly talk about it around the town.
00:39But whenever people asked how he was building a stone castle all on his own,
00:44he simply answered,
00:45I cracked the secret of the pyramids.
00:49This story begins in Latvia, Edward Lidskalnin's home country.
00:53Edward was born in a small village on January 12, 1887.
00:59He was born in a family of stonemasons, which is probably where he learned ancient techniques of building.
01:05However, he grew up as a sickly boy, which meant he could never carry much weight
01:11or undergo heavy physical activity.
01:14At the age of 26, an unfortunate turn of events determined Ed's fate.
01:19The love of his life broke off their engagement,
01:22and heartbroken Ed decided to move to the United States.
01:26He lived in a couple of American states before finally moving to Florida,
01:30where his life's adventure started.
01:34Ed spent years searching for the right spot of land to build his dream house.
01:39He always rejected good farmland.
01:41When people wondered why, he only smiled.
01:45Finally, when he bought land of his own, it was deemed terrible by his close friends.
01:50The soil was bedrock.
01:52He could neither plow nor farm it.
01:54But it seemed perfect for what he was seeking to build.
01:58Ed's close friends would often describe him as eccentric.
02:02When asked why he wanted to build a house, he would only say,
02:06It's for my sweet 16.
02:08Someday she's coming back.
02:10Then, he changed the topic of the conversation.
02:13It took Ed about 30 years to finish Coral Castle, and he did it all by himself.
02:20He would only work under the cloak of night,
02:22and never, never let anyone see what he was doing.
02:28The completed Coral Castle embodies a number of unsolved mysteries.
02:32If you were to visit the site back then, you'd have to go through a 9-ton, 8-foot-tall
02:38revolving gate door
02:39that even a kid could push with just one finger.
02:43Ed was so proud of this door that he originally named the site Rock Gate Park.
02:48It was renamed Coral Castle only much later, after Ed's passing.
02:54Once inside, visitors would access the incredible wonders of Ed's constructions.
03:00Towers, mystic symbols, furniture, and swin sets, all made entirely of monolithic blocks of stone.
03:07The stones are set on top of each other, using only their weight to keep them together.
03:13And, believe it or not, the entire park gathers around 1,100 tons of stone.
03:19Today, if you visit Ed's living quarters, you'll even see the simple instruments he used to construct all of this.
03:27Chisels, hammers, ropes, and pulleys.
03:29The type of work he did is difficult, even with modern-day equipment, let alone without it.
03:35The only photograph of Ed Lidskalnin at work shows a simple leverage structure of a chain hoist attached to a
03:42wooden tripod.
03:43The tripod was made of old telephone poles, with a small wooden box on top.
03:49What was in the box is, of course, a mystery.
03:53Unfortunately, he took his secrets with him, not sharing the truth of his work with anyone else.
04:00Yet, not all is lost, as there are many theories and speculation surrounding what could have happened there.
04:08One theory says that there is a harmonic grid inside the Earth's surface,
04:13something that would create anti-gravity spots around the globe.
04:17It's believed that Coral Castle was built in such a spot.
04:21This could explain why it took Ed so long to find land that pleased him.
04:26Maybe what he was looking for was a place that allowed him to experiment with anti-gravity forces.
04:34Yet, whenever Ed talked about his work, he would say he understood the laws of weight and leverage,
04:40and, sure thing, that he had cracked the secret of the pyramid builders.
04:45And what secret is that, you might ask?
04:47According to Ed himself, it has to do with magnetism.
04:52He even published a pamphlet called Magnetic Current.
04:56There, he explains that every object has magnetic particles inside of them.
05:01A person just needs to understand where they are located inside such objects.
05:05This way, objects can be lifted and moved around without much effort,
05:10just like moving something heavy underwater.
05:14Researchers say that if we assume Ed Litzkalnen and the pyramid builders used the same technique,
05:20then it would only have taken 4,700 workers to build the Great Pyramid of Giza,
05:25instead of the 20,000 to 100,000 that is currently estimated.
05:29But this story just keeps on getting more and more mysterious.
05:34In the late 1920s, Ed was finishing the construction of Coral Castle in Florida City.
05:40Rumors about his work had spread around town.
05:43People said Ed was hiding a stash of money somewhere in his living quarters.
05:48One night, a group of men waited until Ed was alone and broke into the castle to rob him.
05:54They couldn't find the money and, luckily, didn't harm Ed.
05:58But in the following days, he decided that it was best he moved out of that land.
06:03Of course, he took more than his toothbrush along with him.
06:07Ed decided to move the entire Coral Castle to another land 10 kilometers away from where he had built the
06:14park.
06:16Legend says he hired a truck driver and asked him to swear secrecy about what Ed intended to do.
06:22He asked the driver to look away while Ed loaded the truck by himself, moving all of the rocks without
06:29any help.
06:30With the truck loaded, Ed and his castle moved to Homestead, Florida, where the park is located until this day.
06:38In 1986, a group of engineers from Florida University was called to try to fix the park's gate entrance,
06:46the nine-ton revolving door that Ed was so proud of.
06:49They arrived with plenty of modern-day equipment, including a 20-ton crane.
06:54When the engineers took the door down, they noticed that Ed had used a strange circular stone at the bottom
07:02of the revolving door.
07:03The engineers couldn't understand how this frisbee-sized rock could withstand nine tons of weight without breaking into pieces.
07:11They sent the rock to the geology department at the University of Florida.
07:15But the geologists simply returned the rock, saying they couldn't find a match of this rock in their databases.
07:21They couldn't determine its origin.
07:25The engineers put the nine-ton gate back into place, trying to use other techniques.
07:30At first, it didn't work without the base rock Ed had originally used.
07:35So, they had to cut the gate rock to make it work as a revolving door once again,
07:40proving that modern-day technology couldn't replicate what Ed had done single-handedly.
07:46Fast forward to 2011, and another man claimed to have cracked the code of the pyramid builders and Ed Leitzkielnen
07:53himself.
07:54Wally Wallington, a retired construction worker from Lapeer County, Michigan,
07:59has managed to build using similar techniques to those used by Ed.
08:04Wallington is known for having built his personal Stonehenge in Michigan.
08:09He is said to have used simple machines, such as levers and counterweights,
08:13moving around multi-thousand-pound concrete blocks.
08:16Unlike Ed, Wallington has shared his techniques with the public.
08:20Multiple videos are showing the clever engineering he built from very simple materials.
08:25It sure is impressive.
08:27The man has moved his entire barn into another property just with the help of simple tools.
08:33However, there is no way to prove that these were the same techniques used to build Coral Castle.
08:39To this day, the secrets of Coral Castle haven't been unraveled.
08:44But hey, we can always keep trying to solve it.
08:49You find yourself at a food fair in Iceland when you see it for the first time.
08:54Volcano bread!
08:56You eat a slice and oddly enough, it actually tastes good.
09:00Unsure of how this works, you check out the baking process.
09:04Hmm.
09:05Is this kitchen really strange looking?
09:07Or is it just me?
09:09The baking spot is in nature, specifically in a hot springs field.
09:14You better watch your steps so you don't get burned by the hot vapor jolting from the ground.
09:19Now, a local baker shares their traditional rye bread recipe with you.
09:24Rye flour?
09:25Check.
09:26Yeast?
09:26Check.
09:27You mix it all together and pour it into a metal pot.
09:30Next on the list is digging the hole where you'll place the pot to bake.
09:35You dig for about 16 inches until you can see the water bubbling from the ground.
09:40If you want to do it like a local, you'll use your finger to check the water temperature.
09:45Yikes!
09:45That's hot!
09:47Actually, the ground is heated by lava.
09:50Iceland is one of the most volcanic regions in the world with over 30 active volcanoes at any one time.
09:57After you bury the bread in volcanic soil, you leave it there and wait 24 hours until it's ready.
10:03The next day, the bread is fully baked and super tasty.
10:08Ah, and the best part is, you just participated in an ancient Icelandic tradition.
10:13People have been doing this since at least the 1800s.
10:18Imagine it's your first day of work in a museum and your assigned task is to clean the mask of
10:24Tutankhamen.
10:25You grab your cleaning utensils and then, oh no, this can't be happening.
10:29You just broke Tutankhamen's beard.
10:31I never wish this to happen to anyone, but this is actually a true story.
10:37Back in 2014, an employee at the Egyptian Museum knocked off the beard of Tutankhamen's mask and glued it back
10:44on, hoping no one would notice.
10:46This mask was discovered in 1922 and is considered one of the 10 symbols of our human civilization.
10:53Oh, and the best part of this story?
10:56It took historians until 2016 to discover the poor glue job.
11:01So, if you visited the museum between 2004 and 2016, maybe you saw the glued beard.
11:09If I say Sahara, what comes to mind?
11:12An infinite desert landscape, right?
11:15Well, according to scientists, the Sahara isn't always a desert.
11:19From time to time, it becomes green.
11:22But you probably won't be seeing this in your lifetime.
11:25Every 10,000 years, the Sahara lives through a humid period, where the sand gives way to lush green vegetation
11:33and sparkling lakes.
11:34This happens due to a tilt in the Earth's axis, which affects different weather patterns around the globe.
11:41Can you imagine the Sphinx surrounded by rainforest?
11:44It's mind-blowing.
11:46And speaking of the Sahara, say you traveled back to 1800 BCE.
11:51If you timed it right, you might get to see the construction of the so-called Black Pyramid in the
11:56city of Dashur.
11:58These are not the famous Giza pyramids, but they serve the similar purpose of being a final resting place.
12:05In 1892, archaeologists excavating the area found an important part of the Black Pyramid that was lost for centuries.
12:13The Benben, also called a Pyramidian, was the tip of ancient Egyptian pyramids.
12:18A Benben consists of a solid block, usually made of limestone.
12:23Most of them were covered with gold and reflected the first rays of light from the sun every day.
12:28Hmm, can anyone get me a time machine, please?
12:33Remember when you ate something really spicy, your cheeks turned red?
12:37Apparently, that can happen to birds, too.
12:40For example, canaries can change colors after eating peppers.
12:44These birds have a special pigment that allows them to switch shades depending on their diet.
12:49So, if a yellow canary eats red peppers, it can turn orange or red.
12:54Can rocks move on the ground on their own?
12:57Well, you might be under that impression if you visit Racetrack Playa in California.
13:02The site is a dry lake bed and home to one of the world's strangest phenomena, the so-called Sailing
13:09Stones.
13:09Think 100-pound rocks moving around alone, leaving behind trails as long as 1,500 feet.
13:16They were discovered in the 1900s, and until recently, no one was lucky enough to be on the site while
13:21they were moving.
13:22It was only in 2014, after much observation and research, that scientists solved this mystery.
13:30The Sailing Stones appeared because of the perfect balance between wind, ice, and water.
13:36When it rains, the water that falls on the ground freezes and forms a coat of ice above the ground.
13:42If it's windy, the rocks are easily pushed around, sailing along the lake bed.
13:47But hey, if you ever visit Racetrack Playa, don't disturb the rocks.
13:53On the western coast of France, you'll find the vacation hotspot known as the Island of Ré.
13:58It attracts tourists looking for scenic landscapes and beautiful beaches, but that's not all it's famous for.
14:05There, an extraordinary phenomenon occurs when two different wave patterns collide with each other, something called a cross sea.
14:13It's almost as if the sea were a checkerboard divided into hundreds of squares, and no, it's not an optical
14:20illusion.
14:21A cross sea only happens in places where different quality waters meet.
14:26For a tourist to see the cross sea in Ré, this probably means that there was a storm in a
14:31different sea nearby.
14:32This stormy water travels with the help of currents and meets the water of Ré, creating these oddly shaped riptides.
14:40Oh, and apart from this island and Israel, there's nowhere else in the world where you could see such a
14:45thing.
14:47The following sight will either give you goosebumps or make you marvel at its weirdness.
14:53I'd say it depends on the time of day you visit.
14:55Next to the small town of Gryfina in Poland, you'll find a very unusual sight, a pine tree forest where
15:02each tree is bent at its base.
15:05If you visit during the daytime, I guess you'll be fascinated by these trees' sharp 90-degree curves.
15:11You can even use their trunks as a stool if you decide to have a picnic, for example.
15:16But visiting the site at night will most likely give you chills.
15:20A thin layer of fog hovers around, making the forest seem quite unwelcoming.
15:26Scientists still can't explain why the trees are the way they are.
15:30So, are you a daytime or nighttime visitor?
15:34You went for a hike and suddenly encountered a big cloud of fog.
15:39This may ruin your photo ops, but there's one thing you can hope for.
15:42Foggy days are the perfect conditions for a phenomenon called fog bow, otherwise known as a white rainbow.
15:50This happens because of numerous tiny water droplets that cause fog, smaller than 0.002 inches.
15:58So, instead of the multicolored bow, you get a transparent one, with red outer edges and a bluish inner edge.
16:06Now, say you're roaming in a little town in Europe, appreciating the century-old buildings and good summer weather.
16:13You feel hungry and decide to type into your Google Maps the name of that restaurant your friend recommended.
16:19Ah, it's only 10 minutes away by foot.
16:21You follow the blue dot on your GPS and arrive at your destination, quick and easy.
16:27We all love this free piece of technology, don't we?
16:30But what if I told you that the U.S. spends over $2 million daily to maintain the satellites to
16:36make it work?
16:37Yep, that's the price.
16:39And to implement it, they spent over $12 billion U.S. dollars.
16:45Have you ever heard of something called a natural snowball?
16:48This could be proof that nature is really perfect.
16:52In 2016, the beaches of the Gulf of Ob in northwest Siberia were filled with rows of giant snowballs.
17:01Think balls measuring up to 3 feet across.
17:04This rare, yet beautiful natural phenomenon happens when small pieces of ice are rolled by strong winds and water.
17:12The further they roll, the more ice they gather and the more that ice is polished.
17:17They end up as giant, perfectly shaped snowballs.
17:20They look pretty amazing on their own, but it's quite a sight when hundreds of them are together.
17:27Discovering hidden places on our planet is extremely exciting.
17:30Today, I'm taking you on a trip that you aren't going to forget anytime soon.
17:34But suit up, this is about to get very cold.
17:37You hop on a plane and land on the ice-covered island of Greenland.
17:41An unbelievable view of the Aurora Borealis, a.k.a. the Northern Lights, is greeting you.
17:47You can't believe your eyes.
17:49Your guide tells you how rare this phenomenon is.
17:52Usually, people spend days trying to hunt it down.
17:55You feel lucky and take your time to appreciate these beautiful, dancing, greenish lights.
18:00You're glad you brought your camera along, aren't you?
18:03Between clicks, you learn that the Aurora Borealis is the result of some rather rough events.
18:08This spectacular light show occurs when energy particles from the sun slam into Earth's upper atmosphere.
18:15On day two, you continue to explore the place by air.
18:19This may not come as a surprise, but Greenland is one of the world's largest islands.
18:25This time, on board a helicopter, you can see the infinite icy landscape.
18:29In case you're curious, you're now flying over 656,000 square miles of thick ice.
18:36Oh, what's that down there?
18:38It looks like a family of polar bears.
18:40You don't want to get too close, of course.
18:43The conditions in Greenland might be too tough for people to live there, but some animal species do very well
18:49in this land of ice.
18:50Those are reindeer, wolves, and Arctic foxes.
18:55On your way to Greenland, you probably made a pit stop in Copenhagen.
18:59Denmark is one of the few countries that have commercial flights to Greenland.
19:03You didn't know this before, but you find out that the island is actually part of the Kingdom of Denmark.
19:09On a map, it's right between the Arctic and Atlantic oceans.
19:14You're lucky to have a local pilot that tells you about the secrets hidden in this scenery.
19:19Under this two-mile-thick white surface, there's an entirely different world.
19:24A world filled with canyons, meteor-carved craters, and millennia-old plant fossils.
19:30You are beyond excited to go visit one of these spots, but of course, you'll have to use your imagination,
19:36as all of it is hidden under ice.
19:38Believe it or not, nearly 80% of the island's surface is covered with it.
19:45The first stop on your tour is Greenland's Grand Canyon.
19:49You land not far from it, somewhere in the northern part of the island.
19:52You may know that canyons are deep, narrow valleys with steep sides.
19:57But I bet you didn't know that the word canyon actually comes from the Spanish word canyon, which means tube
20:03or pipe.
20:05Now, this Grand Canyon has some similarities with the one in the U.S.
20:09First of all, in size, it's at least 460 miles long and up to 2,600 feet deep in some
20:16places.
20:18There's a true subglacial valley down there, and if you're wondering how this happened, well, the canyon had probably been
20:24formed by a river that had been flowing through Greenland before the ice took over.
20:28Oh yeah, Greenland hasn't always been covered with ice.
20:32It was once green, no pun intended.
20:35Many other icy places on Earth, such as Antarctica, were once covered in greenery.
20:40Scientists have figured out that in the past, Greenland was mostly ice-free.
20:45With the help of airborne radar, they made amazing discoveries.
20:49By the way, ice is invisible to radar technology.
20:52If you have trouble believing it, try putting an ice cube inside your microwave.
20:57It won't melt or heat up.
20:59A recent discovery of fossilized plants allowed researchers to estimate that Greenland used to be much warmer than they could
21:06imagine.
21:072021 research conducted by the University of Vermont found fossils of twigs and leaves, which left researchers very confused.
21:15They expected to discover sand and rocks in the deepest layer of ice, but instead, they found some clear proof
21:22of rich flora.
21:24Judging by what you've seen of the landscape, it's hard to believe that forests were once growing here.
21:30Today, you'll find some tundra vegetation on the coastal part of the island, and that's pretty much it.
21:35But according to the genetic material found in these fossilized plants, researchers believe the island used to be much greener.
21:42It's very likely that there were insect-filled forests with butterflies and beetles flying around.
21:48And the average temperature on the island varied from 50 degrees Fahrenheit in the summer to 1 degrees Fahrenheit in
21:54the winter.
21:56NASA's Operation Ice Bridge has flown over Greenland more than 100 times.
22:00This has allowed researchers to create 3D maps of the island and figure out the age of each layer of
22:06ice in Greenland's ice sheet.
22:08Ice sheets can help answer many scientific questions as they form over the span of thousands of years.
22:15There are layers of snow on top of more snow.
22:18The snow gets compacted into ice, which in turn creates what we call an ice sheet.
22:23Remember those fossils we were talking about?
22:25They're believed to be from the Eemian period, which was 130,000 to 115,000 years ago.
22:34According to the groundbreaking 3D footage from NASA, we can see three distinct climate periods within the ice sheet.
22:41The uppermost layer is quite flat and uniform.
22:44If you decided to dig deeper, you'd find the layer formed during the last ice age.
22:49It's more complex and rugged.
22:51The ice there is darker than what you see on the surface.
22:54If you let your mind wander, you can picture what this part of the world looked like when mammoths were
22:59roaming around.
23:00If you kept digging, you'd eventually find leftover ice from the Eemian period I've told you about.
23:06Now, canyons aren't the only unusual thing found under ice.
23:10If you could sneak a peek under all those layers of snow, you'd see an impressive mountain range and also
23:15plunging fjords.
23:17In 2017, scientists created a map that showed what Greenland had looked like without all that ice.
23:24There was a bull-like depression in the middle of the enormous island.
23:28This depression was most likely an ancient lake.
23:31Around it, there was a circle of coastal mountain ranges.
23:34This scenery probably resembled the landscapes of modern Patagonia.
23:39Big mountains with snowy tops surrounding crystalline lakes.
23:44This ancient lake in Greenland is a wonder on its own.
23:48Imagine a pit the size of Rhode Island and Delaware put together.
23:51The lake is believed to have covered over 2,700 square miles.
23:56And back in the day, it was fed by at least 18 different streams.
24:00These crystalline blue waters were surely very inviting and freezing, of course.
24:05But if you ended up going for a swim, I'd say be careful, as the water could get up to
24:10800 feet deep in some places.
24:14On day 3 of your adventure, you discover a true under ice water park.
24:18While you're wandering around the ice-covered island, your guide tells you to be mindful of the cracks in the
24:23surface.
24:25These cracks are responsible for the modern-day aqua lounge going on down there.
24:30Meltwater and rainwater flow down the cracks in the ice all the way down to the riverbeds.
24:35This forms a landscape of jewel-like lakes and streams filled with crystalline water.
24:41Researchers estimate that about 60 small under-ice lakes exist there.
24:45And yes, they're actual lakes.
24:48Perhaps one of the most impressive hidden features on this island is a meteor crater.
24:53Under the Hiawatha Glacier, you can find a 19-mile-wide impact crater, big enough to swallow the city of
25:00Washington.
25:01Apparently, a mile-wide iron asteroid struck Earth's atmosphere within the past 100,000 years and chose Greenland as its
25:08landing point.
25:09If anyone had been around to see it, they'd have witnessed a real show, a white glowing fireball cutting through
25:16the sky.
25:17Scientists speculate that if it had landed on an ice sheet, it certainly vaporized both water and stone.
25:23Someone standing hundreds of miles from the impact site would have heard a deafening thunderclap and experienced hurricane-force winds.
25:31But it actually makes sense.
25:33The approximate speed of meteors entering Earth's atmosphere is 45,000 miles per hour.
25:39For comparison, that is two and a half times the speed of a spaceship.
25:43It's bound to make some noise and leave a huge crater in the ground.