Journey Around the Globe [2] Trivia Quiz

Answer: Rio de Janeiro, Brazil

Paquetá Island is a short ferry ride across Rio's Guanabara Bay and, despite the hustle and crowded streets of (perhaps) Brazil's most festive city on the coast, the island is actually quite serene-- there's no traffic due to a complete lack of motorized vehicles.

The island is also notable for being one of the only places in South America to contain the African baobab tree, a plant that would normally grow in drier climates, but which finds itself planted there. The only other ones in Brazil are in Fortaleza, further north.

The island was settled by local natives, the French, and the Portuguese before its current inhabitants.

Answer: Argentina

Found in the south of Brazil/north of Argentina, Iguazu Falls (also known as Iguaçu Falls in Portuguese) is jointly maintained and viewed from national parks in both countries. A stunning natural landmark, the falls are fed by the Iguazu River which discharge one of the highest volumes of water of any falls worldwide. Four-fifths of the falls drop on the Argentinean side of the border, which actually cuts through the site.

The jungles around the falls are also home to many local species of forest wildlife from jaguars to toucans.

Answer: Robben Island

Table Bay, sitting on the edge of Cape Town, South Africa, heads along the coast to the Cape of Good Hope and sits in the shadow of the city's largest feature, Table Mountain, which stands over a kilometer tall. Robben Island, now a UNESCO World Heritage Site, was once a maximum security prison-- think the Alcatraz of Africa-- for political prisoners including Nelson Mandela, who resided there for eighteen years.

In later decades he became the South African President, "TIME's" Person of the Year, and a Nobel Peace Prize winner for his contributions to the dissolution of Apartheid.

The prison still remains on the island, closed since the mid-1990s, as a monument and historical site.

Answer: Namib Desert

If this is on your itinerary, you're in Namibia, found on the Atlantic Coast of Africa. Swakopmund is a small city on the edge of the ocean and it backs immediately onto the Namib Desert, an extensive reach of sand and granite mountains. It's unsurprising that Namibia is one of the most sparsely-populated nations around the globe; between the arid sands and the...well...further sands, the country lives, for the most part, in the extreme west in Swakopmund or the central capital of Windhoek. Beyond the desert is the savannah and some of the continent's most varied wildlife reserves.

Answer: Thailand

Ratchaburi is a short way out of Bangkok, the Thai capital, and the province of the same name (in which it is located) begins the long, narrow stretch south along the Myanmar border to the west and into the Andaman Sea. Wat Kao Chong Phran, one of the many Buddhist temples in the area, is specifically devoted to bats and rests atop large caverns home to millions of them.

At night, torrents of bats emerge from the cave, returning before sunrise. Ratchaburi has an extensive history of former rulers and a number of religious sites and ruins.

Answer: Hong Kong

Hong Kong, a financial and commercial hub in Southern Asia, is a region of China known for fitting seven million people into a very cramped space. One of the world's most important centers for commerce and industry, much of Hong Kong is built upwards instead of outwards.

The skyline is particularly famous, simply due to the abundance of skyscrapers dotting the edges around the harbours and bays. Hong Kong is across the Zhujiang River Estuary from Macau and only a short way off from Guangzhou. But imagine the traffic...

Answer: Coober Pedy

Coober Pedy is unique in that, like the mines nearby, many of the dwellings in the town are built underground to protect its inhabitants from the overbearingly hot, arid outback weather. Not only does Coober Pedy contain one of the world's hottest golf courses, but its temperatures skyrocket early in the year.

It's equidistant between Alice Springs to the north and Adelaide to the south, but only if you're planning on taking a really long trip across the country from the middle to bottom. Did I mention it's stinkin' hot?

Answer: Nevis River

Nevis River is home to the world-famous Nevis Highwire Platform, a landmark rising 134m above the bottom of the bluff on New Zealand's South Island. Suspended by cables and only reachable by shuttle and gondola, the platform also has a glass bottom, making it the perfect place to lose control of bodily functions if you're afraid of heights like me.

The Nevis River is found near the city of Queenstown, a resort town in the country's Lake District.

Answer: Molokini

Found off the coast of Maui, this small island is the remnant of a volcano which blew its top hundreds of thousands of years ago. What's left is the outer rim of the crater, which curves around in a crescent shape to create a bay that protects its contents from the surf of the ocean.

Inside is a world-famous snorkeling site containing coral and exotic fish. During WWII, due to the proximity of Pearl Harbor and other naval sites, Molokini was used as, for lack of a better word, target practice, causing outcry from locals who, over the next decades were forced to remove undetonated explosives and wait for the undersea ecosystem to rebuild.

Answer: California

Fort Baker is a historical site overlooking the Golden Gate Bridge in Sausalito, across the bay from San Francisco, California. Once run and operated by the U.S. Army, the fort has since become a tourist site, mainly for its view which, on a clear day, can give unparalleled views of the iconic suspension bridge. From Fort Baker you can also see Alcatraz, but you would need to head into the city to get a ferry to visit that landmark.