Best Badland

Dinosaur Provincial Park is a UNESCO World Heritage Site in Alberta, Canada, designated in 1979 and recognized as one of the richest Cretaceous dinosaur fossil sites on Earth with over 40 species identified.

Olduvai Gorge is an archaeological and paleoanthropological site in northern Tanzania, within the Ngorongoro Conservation Area and the broader East African Rift system. Its exposed sedimentary layers preserve stone tools, animal remains, and hominin fossils spanning a long period of early human evol...

Purnululu National Park protects the Bungle Bungle Range in the remote Kimberley region of Western Australia. The landscape is distinguished by eroded sandstone domes with alternating orange and dark bands, together with narrow gorges, cliffs, seasonal waterways, and surrounding savanna. The park wa...

Ischigualasto Provincial Park is a protected badlands landscape in San Juan Province, Argentina, noted for exposed rock sequences from the Triassic Period. Together with neighboring Talampaya National Park, it was inscribed on the UNESCO World Heritage List in 2000. Its sedimentary formations preser...

Wadi el-Hitan, or Whale Valley, is a fossil site in Egypt's Western Desert within Faiyum Governorate and a UNESCO World Heritage Site. Its Eocene deposits contain numerous archaeocete whale skeletons, including specimens with reduced hind limbs, alongside fossils of other marine organisms. The site...

Valle de la Luna is an arid landscape in the Cordillera de la Sal near San Pedro de Atacama in northern Chile. Wind and occasional water erosion have shaped its salt, clay, and rock deposits into ridges, ravines, caves, and dune fields, while exposed mineral salts create pale crusts across parts of...

Talampaya National Park is a protected area in La Rioja Province, Argentina, characterized by red sandstone cliffs, broad canyons, and dry desert terrain. Together with neighboring Ischigualasto Provincial Park, it forms the Ischigualasto-Talampaya UNESCO World Heritage Site, inscribed in 2000. Its...

Valle de la Luna is a popular name for the eroded landscape of Ischigualasto Provincial Park in San Juan Province, Argentina. Its exposed gray and ochre sedimentary formations, isolated rock shapes, and sparse vegetation produce the moonlike appearance reflected in the name. The park forms part of t...

The Turkana Basin is a geological and drainage basin centered on Lake Turkana and extending across northern Kenya and southern Ethiopia within the East African Rift system. Its exposed sedimentary deposits preserve fossils and archaeological evidence spanning major stages of primate and human evolut...

The Zhangye Danxia landforms are a group of colorful eroded hills near Zhangye in Gansu Province, northwestern China. Alternating mineral-rich layers of sandstone and other sedimentary rock were tilted by tectonic forces and subsequently carved into ridges, cliffs, and gullies by weathering and eros...

The Painted Hills are one of the three units of John Day Fossil Beds National Monument in central Oregon. Their bands of red, gold, black, and gray record changing environmental conditions in ancient floodplain deposits, with the visible colors produced by different minerals and degrees of soil deve...

The Danakil Depression is a low-lying desert region in the Afar area of northeastern Ethiopia, near the junction of several tectonic plates. Parts of it lie more than 100 meters below sea level, and the region is marked by extreme heat, salt flats, volcanic activity, and hydrothermal fields colored...

Dinosaur National Monument is a protected area spanning northeastern Utah and northwestern Colorado, established in 1915 around a major dinosaur fossil quarry. At the Quarry Exhibit Hall, visitors can see more than 1,500 dinosaur bones preserved in an exposed rock face, including remains of large Ju...

Mungo National Park is a protected area in southwestern New South Wales, Australia, within the UNESCO-listed Willandra Lakes Region. Its dry lake bed, dunes, and eroded lunette known as the Walls of China preserve evidence of long-term Aboriginal occupation and major changes in climate and landscape...

Bisti/De-Na-Zin Wilderness is a 45,000-acre federally designated wilderness in northwestern New Mexico managed by the BLM, known for its alien-looking hoodoos, petrified wood, and Cretaceous dinosaur fossils.

The Flaming Cliffs, also called Bayanzag, are a fossil-rich area of red and orange sandstone in Mongolia's Gobi Desert. Expeditions led by Roy Chapman Andrews for the American Museum of Natural History worked there during the 1920s and uncovered important Cretaceous fossils, including dinosaur nests...

Makhtesh Ramon is a large erosion landform in Israel's Negev Desert, centered near the town of Mitzpe Ramon. Roughly 40 kilometers long, it is a makhtesh, a steep-sided valley created when erosion removed softer rock beneath resistant surface layers after geological uplift and folding. It is therefo...

Drumheller Badlands is a dramatic eroded valley in Alberta, Canada, carved by the Red Deer River and home to the Royal Tyrrell Museum, which holds one of the world's largest displays of dinosaur skeletons.

John Day Fossil Beds National Monument is a protected area in eastern Oregon preserving an extensive record of Cenozoic plants, animals, and environmental change spanning roughly 40 million years. The monument comprises the Clarno, Painted Hills, and Sheep Rock units, each with distinct geology and...

The Little Missouri Badlands are an eroded landscape surrounding the Little Missouri River in western North Dakota. Layered sedimentary rocks have been shaped into steep gullies, ridges, buttes, and exposed bands of differently colored material, while grasslands occupy many of the gentler surfaces....

Las Médulas is a cultural landscape in León, Spain, shaped by large-scale Roman gold mining. Roman engineers used water channels and hydraulic techniques, including ruina montium, to fracture and wash away parts of the terrain, leaving red pinnacles amid chestnut woodland. The archaeological landsca...

Quebrada de Humahuaca is a long, narrow Andean valley in Jujuy Province in northwestern Argentina. The Río Grande corridor has served for thousands of years as a route linking the high Andes with lower plains, and the valley contains archaeological sites, colonial settlements, agricultural terraces,...

Palo Duro Canyon is an extensive canyon system in the Texas Panhandle, southeast of Amarillo, carved primarily by the Prairie Dog Town Fork of the Red River. Its multicolored sedimentary layers, steep walls, mesas, and hoodoos are protected in Palo Duro Canyon State Park. Roads, trails, campsites, a...

Kerlingarfjöll is a volcanic mountain range in Iceland's central highlands, reached from the Kjölur highland route. Its rhyolite mountains display red, yellow, and brown tones, while the Hveradalir area contains steaming vents, hot ground, and other geothermal features. The remote terrain attracts h...

The White Desert is a chalk landscape in Egypt's Western Desert near the Farafra Oasis. Windblown sand has eroded the pale rock into isolated towers, pinnacles, and rounded forms that contrast with the surrounding desert floor. It lies within White Desert National Park and is visited for its unusual...

Ihlara Valley is a gorge in Aksaray Province within Turkey's Cappadocia region, extending for roughly 14 kilometers through volcanic rock. The Melendiz River runs along its floor, where vegetation contrasts with the surrounding plateau. The valley contains numerous rock-cut dwellings and more than 1...

Colorado National Monument is a protected landscape established in 1911 near Grand Junction and Fruita in western Colorado. It preserves deeply cut canyons, red sandstone monoliths, cliffs, and mesas along the northeastern edge of the Uncompahgre Plateau. The National Park Service manages the monume...

Upper Missouri River Breaks National Monument is a 377,000-acre federal monument in north-central Montana established by President Clinton in 2001, protecting badlands, wildlife, and one of the last free-flowing stretches of the Missouri River.

Quebrada de las Conchas, also called Quebrada de Cafayate, is a gorge in Salta Province in northwestern Argentina. Water and wind erosion have exposed and shaped layers of red sandstone and other sedimentary rocks along the route between Salta and Cafayate. Named formations include El Anfiteatro, or...