Guinness World Records has long been recording some of the most amazing and astonishing travel and tourism facts. Here we are sharing some of the most unbelievable record-breaking accounts, all fully fact-checked and Guinness-approved.

Largest Ice Structure—The Ice Hotel in Sweden

    Each year, the ice hotel in Jukkasjarvi, Sweden, is rebuilt from blocks of frozen ice from the nearby River Torne. Covering an area of 5,500 square metres, the hotel is unsurprisingly open seasonally, from December to March, when it melts away. In 2015, the hotel celebrated its 25^th anniversary, complete with an ice bar, an ice church and ice bedrooms—one even featured a London Tube carriage made entirely of ice.

Tallest Waterfall—Angel Falls, Venezuela

    The largest waterfall by vertical(垂直的) area may be Victoria Falls, which sit on the border between Zimbabwe and Zambia, but it's South America that's home to the world's tallest.

    Angel Falls, located in Bolivar, Venezuela, has an impressive, uninterrupted drop of 807 metres.

    It was actually named after the American pilot, Jimmie Angel, who first recorded it in his logbook on November 16, 1933.

Largest Area of Glowing Sea—Indian Ocean, near Somalia

    Bioluminescence(生物体发光) is the production and emission of light by a living thing and can be used to explain the surprising phenomenon(现象)of “glowing oceans.”

    It was in 1995 that scientists detected glowing sea in the Indian Ocean—just off the coast of Somalia-via satellite, The water was more than 250 kilometres long, and it was all thanks to the bacteria called phytoplankton.

Most Expensive Hotel Room—The Royal Penthouse Suite at Geneva's Hotel President Wilsom

    This particular suite is just the ticket, costing as much as US$83,000(£53,760)per night.

    But the high price will gain you access to 12 bedrooms and 12 marble bathrooms across 18,000 square feet.

Authors (作者)

    Alexandru Micu: Author

    ZME Science author profile | e-mail: alex@zmescience.com

    Main focus: technology, biology

    Curiosity (好奇心) is what drives Alex forward-his interest in learning more about the planet being matched only by his ability to discuss things with a light heart. Alex tries to make others more interested in special science and technology. He does things in his own way.

    Dragos Mitrica: Author

    ZME Science author profile | e-mail: dragos@zmescience.com

    Main focus: wheather

    Dragos loves nature, and does everything he can to understand it. This interest led him to many unexpected places in his life, and now, he mainly studies and understands how ancient (古代的) weather changed, and what this means for the future.

    Henry Conrad: Author

    ZME Science author profile | e-mail: henrykconrad@gmail.com

    Main focus: technology

    Henry Conrad is a game developer from Albuquerque, New Mexico. Whenever he's not working or reading the latest tech news, he enjoys writing about the latest inventions and technology, which benefits (有益) him a lot. It helps him find rich writing materials (材料).

    Mihai Andrei: Editor-in-chief

    ZME Science author profile | e-mail: andrei@zmescience.com

    Main focus: geophysics, environment

    Andrei has put a lot of sweat and tears into ZME Science ever since he was a student. He is always looking for the most interesting subjects, presenting them in a way that everybody can understand. He believes that education is the key towards a better future and he tries to persuade people to become better persons of the planet. His background is in Geology and Geophysics, but now, he focuses more on environmental studies.

                                                                                 Is There Life on Earth

    There was great excitement on the planet of Venus this week. For the first time Venusian scientists managed to land a satellite on the planet Earth, and it has been sending back signals as well as photographs ever since.

    The satellite was directed into an area known as Manhattan(named after the great Venusian astronomer Prof. Manhattan, who first discovered it with his telescope 20,000 light years ago). Because of excellent weather conditions and extremely strong signals, Venusian scientists were able to get valuable information as to the feasibility(可行性)of a manned flying saucer(飞碟)landing on Earth. A press conference was held at the Venus Institute of Technology.

    “We have come to the conclusion, based on last week's satellite landing,” Pro. Zog said, “that there is no life on the Earth.”

    “How do you know this?” the science reporter of the Venus Evening Star asked.

    “For on thing, Earth's surface in the area of Manhattan is composed of solid concrete and nothing can grow there. For another, the atmosphere is filled with carbon monoxide and other deadly gases and nobody could possibly breathe this air and survive.”

    “What does this mean as far as our flying saucer program is concerned?”

    “We shall have to take our own oxygen with us, which means heavier flying saucer than we originally planned.”

    “Are there any other risks that you discovered in your studies?”

    “Take a look at his photo. You see this dark black cloud floating over the surface of Earth?” We call this the Consolidated Edison Belt. We don't know what it is made of, but it could give us a lot of trouble and we shall have to make further tests before we send a Venus Being there.”

    “If what you say is true, won't this set back the flying saucer program several years?”

    “Yes, but we shall proceed as soon as the Grubstart gives us the added funds.”

    “Pro. Zog, why are we spending billions and billions of zilches to land a flying saucer on Earth when there is no life there?

    “Because if we Venusians can learn to breathe in an Earth atmosphere, then. We can live anywhere.”

    Last April, on a Sunday, we took one of our “nowhere” drives. My husband was quietly driving along a back road. I was occupied in the front passenger seat watching the scenery.

    I noticed out of the corner of my eye that my husband was struggling to look out of my window. This frightened me, since his eyes should be on the road in front of him. I asked him what he was looking at out of the windows, and he quietly replied, “Nothing.”

    After a few minutes, I looked over at my husband and noticed a tear running down his cheek. I asked him what was wrong. This time he told me, “I was just thinking about Pop and a story he had once told me.” It had something to do with Pop, his friend from childhood, and I wanted to know the story, so I asked him to share it with me.

    He said, “When I was 8 years old, Pop and I were out fishing and he told me that the pine trees know when it is Easter.”

    I have no idea what he meant by that, so I pressed him for more information.

    He continued on… “The pine trees start their new growth in the weeks before Easter because spring is drawing near. If you look at the tops of the pine trees, you will see the yellow shoots. As the days get closer to Easter Sunday, the tallest shoot will branch off and form a cross. By the time Easter Sunday comes around, you will see that most of the pine trees will have small yellow crosses on all of the tallest shoots.”

    I turned to look out of the window and I couldn't believe my eyes. It was a week before Easter, and you could see all of the trees with the tall yellow shoots stretching to the sky.

    The tallest ones shone in the sunlight like rows of tiny golden crosses. May you find your Easter season filled with beautiful golden crosses!

When I decided to quit my job as a wedding photographer, I was in my late twenties, fresh from my divorce from Bob who had left me empty and confused. I decided to leave the US and travel. I had no savings, plus more than $5,000 in debt. What I did have were two sponsored tasks as a travel photographer—and with that along, I thought, it would be easy.

My first experience was a road trip from Toronto to Las Vegas, paid for by a car delivery service. Other trips followed and then I started a travel blog (博客). It was intended to be my calling card for assignment travel photography. Yet even with my blog and past experience, email after email I sent to publications, trying to get work, went unanswered. When they did get in touch, editors told me that I had no chance of making a career with travel photography. While I struggled to get on the path that I wanted, and as I expanded my blog to help get me there, I found myself wearing the hat of a full­time blogger.

Luckily, I got in at the right time. It was 2010, and the travel industry was just starting to turn its attention to bloggers. As I never could have predicted, my blogging—not my photography—did take me around the world successfully. At first, I thought it was for personal reasons, but I realized later that it was for free marketing for my blogging.

Within two years, I was being asked to speak at travel blogging conferences, which helped me to raise a network of friends around the world. Even more meaningful, however, was when I saw that my travels were also helping other people. My blog and social media followers saw that I chased my dreams and told me over and over again how they needed that kind of example, which was absent in their lives elsewhere.

It takes just four minutes for brain cells to be permanently damaged due to a severe lack of oxygen in cases of sudden cardiac arrest (心搏停止). If medical workers do not arrive at the scene of such emergencies within 10 minutes, the chances of a victim surviving are minimal.

In September, a 45-year-old man fell unconscious at Huoying station on Line 13 of the Beijing Subway. He died later in the hospital, despite attempts by two passengers to revive him by using cardiopulmonary resuscitation, or CPR. However, if an automated external defibrillator, or AED, had been a vailable at the scene, the man's chances of survival would have been greatly improved.

An AED can recognize an abnormal lheart rhythm and quickly correct it through an electric shock. The devices are viewed in medical circles as a more efficient and effective method of saving lives in emergencies than using CPR. After a brief training period, people with no medical knowledge can master the basic skills needed to use an AED.

In May last year, a student at Tsinghua University in Beijing fainted in a dormitory after experiencing head sweats. Several students began to perform CPR and also used a newly installed AED to help the stricken freshman. After two electric shocks were administered, the student's heart beat was restored and he was sent to the hospital for further treatment. An emergency doctor from the hospital who attended the scene said it was highly likely the student would have died, had not a series of the correct first aid measures been applied, along with the AED.  

PeiZheng, a staff member from Tsinghua University's Policy Research Office, said it was "really cool" that AEDs were available at the institution. "It's so good that we have these life-saving machines on campus, otherwise we would have heard tragic news," she said. The devices have been installed around the campus in stages.