This has got to be the world’s largest can of 7 Up, and even better – it’s actually full of 246,051 litres (65,000 gallons) of 7 Up!

(OK that’s not entirely true. The 19 metre can is actually a water tower, but the water which passes through it really does get turned into 7 Up.)

7 Up was launched in 1929 named “Bib-Label Lithiated Lemon-Lime Soda”, which was caramel coloured and contained lithium citrate, a mood-stabilizing drug. They changed the name almost immediately, but the psychiatric medicine stayed in until 1950.

More info at Roadside America and Wikipedia.

The Kawarau River and Bridge in New Zealand both have notable claims to fame.

The river, which runs between Lake Wakatipu and Lake Dunstan, played its part in the Lord of the Rings films as Middle Earth’s Great River Anduin.

The Bridge, 43m above the river, was the site of the world’s first commercial bungee jumping when way back in 1988 a Mr A J Hackett thought that people might actually pay him to jump off a bridge. Here’s a Youtube I found of someone doing just that.

Thanks: Talullah

For some unknown reason somebody is carving giant letters ‘HA’ into a sand bar near Abu Dhabi. The 500m tall water letters are very neat but it’s a lot of effort just to laugh into space.

Perhaps it’s just the beginning of a longer word? HARRY? HASTA LA VISTA? HALP (sic)?

Thanks: Heather Muise

Damming the Paraná River on the border between Brazil and Paraguay sits an incredible engineering achievement – the largest hydroelectric power plant in the world, Itaipú.

Itaipú is 196 metres high and contains enough iron and steel to build 380 Eiffel Towers. It took 40 thousand people to build it, and they had to move 50 million tons of earth and rock to do it.

In 1995 Itaipú provided 25% of the total energy requirement of Brazil, as well as 78% of Paraguay’s! The facility has been constantly upgraded since then, and the expansion is expected to bring the amount of energy produced next year to over 100 million megawatt-hours.

Make sure you zoom in on the flow from the spillway, and there’s more fascinating facts at Wikipedia!

Thanks to floki, Oliver Dueck, Luciano A. Ferrer, Rhaffael C. C de Barros, Bong Laden, Doug Olson, Vinicius Lage, Juliano Oliveira, Olaf van Zandwijk and Manuel Fernandez.

Could these tiny white dots actually by the heads of 5 marines marching through the Californian desert in single file formation?

Quite possible I suppose as we’re near the Marine Corps Air Ground Combat Center Twentynine Palms (yes I realise that’s actually a golf course, but that’s where Wikipedia linked to – the Combat Center is around there somewhere)

Thanks to Anon.