Opened in 1936, renovated in 2004, 68 metres high, with 113 VIP stands, 2 underground garages and 76,000 seats, this is the fantastic looking Olympiastadion in Berlin.

None of it matters tonight of course – not if you’re a French or Italian football fan – as this is where the 2006 World Cup final is being played in just under half an hour.

Really cool stadium though!

Thanks to Giampaolo Bellavite and Bene.

This is the small city of Madurodam in the Netherlands. They have an airport, canals, stadiums, boats, gardens, windmills and bridges with… giant people on them? And there’s some giant cars too! Waaaait a minute…

Madurodam is actually a truly small city – in fact it’s a 1:25 scale model of a Dutch city, which features traditional Dutch buildings, famous landmarks from around the country, and the world’s largest miniature railway! (I know. Just don’t even go there.)

More history and ground level shots of this great sight at Wikipedia and the official site.

Thanks to Mickey Mau.

This is the Urban Stadium in Nuremberg…

Erm, no. It used to be the Urban Stadium, it now appears to be the Frankenstadion…

Sorry. This stadium has been renamed the easyCredit-Stadion for the next 5 years. Except… FIFA have renamed it the FIFA WM-Stadion Nürnberg for the duration of the 2006 World Cup.

Well whatever it’s called, this is the location of tonight’s match between England and Trinidad and Tobago, which despite the odds is promising to be a very interesting match!

More about, er, the stadium in this post at Wikipedia

This is the 69,901 seater Allianz Arena stadium in Munich, Germany, which is due to play host to tonight’s world cup opening match. In which case, they might want to hurry up and put some grass in there Incredibly, the entire stadium is lit up red, blue or white depending on which team is playing, which looks super-cool. They can do combinations too, so might we see something new tonight?

(And yes, before somebody spoils it, this is the first in a series!)

Thanks to Kristian, birphborph, Robertofon, Dennis, Bertrand Capo, Patino, Falco Winschel and Fraser for his joke.

Santa Pod is Europe’s first permanent drag racing venue, and this aerial photo was taken on a race day. This site us a disused WW2 American Air base once called RAF Podington and it was here that Sammy Miller set the current world drag racing record with a time of 3.58 seconds and a speed of 386mph.

Now I’m not much of a Drag Racing expert, but the cars line up at the north end (you can see a few waiting up there) and then race 1/4mile in various different categories called weird things like “Top Fuel”, “Pro Mod” and “Top Alcohol Funny Car”. Halfway along the track there’s also a tractor – but I think it’s just cleaning up rather than racing.

More info on Drag Racing, as ever, on Wikipedia.

Thanks: Rick