The city of Ashgabat – capital of Turkmenistan – is dominated by monuments to one man’s megalomania – former President-for-Life Saparmurat Niyazov. Take, for example, the 75m tall Arch of Neutrality, which he subtly topped with a 12m gold-plated statue of himself. Not content with just a normal statue, he had it created such that it would rotate through the course of each day so it was always facing the sun. ¹

The Arch is an indication that this former Soviet republic declared itself permanently neutral after the Soviet Union fell apart. While this foreign policy initiative had the potential to be positive, internally the country was facing immense hardships, human rights abuses and intense poverty, all while one of the world’s worst dictators spent lavishly on monuments to his madness. Niyazov claimed the title of President-for-Life after an election in which he hand-picked a single candidate for each electoral district.

To the south of the Arch of Neutrality lie the President’s Palace, another large palace for his family, and the Ten Years of Independence Park, one of several lush expanses of green in an otherwise arid city – use of water being just one way in which Niyazov showed his power and spent his money². The park features a large fountain statue of 10 horses, and another gold statue of Niyazov.

One of Niyazov’s more outlandish “achievements” was his authorship of Ruhnama, or Book of the Soul, commemorated in the south of the city with a monument and more fountains. The large replica of the book opens and closes on special occasions (when the motor isn’t burnt out) to reveal video screens showing scenes from his life. The monument is the small circle to the left of the huge white stage / performance / fountain area.

Amongst other marvellous powers, Niyazov claimed the Ruhnama could guarantee entrance to paradise for anyone who read it three times, and heal those suffering from illness after he closed all the hospitals outside the capital. Knowledge of it was essential for any job with the state, and even for taking a driving test. The text is available online in 22 languages if you are in need of enlightenment or struggling with your driving skills.

In the same park as the Ruhnama Monument are the Independence Monument (inspired by tents and headwear; topped by a giant gold spire and fronted by yet another gold statue), a Museum of Turkmen Values, a significant network of ponds and fountains, tributes to past Turkmen heroes, and (seeming rather out of place) a shopping mall inside a huge 5-legged monument which features cascading sheets of water and five-headed eagles, though not many shops apparently.

To the south-west of the city is the modestly-named Turkmenbashi³ Eternally Great Park, starting point of Niyazov’s ‘health walk’ – a strenuous 8km trek which ministers were forced to walk regularly, while the President himself would take the rather less strenuous helicopter option – landing at the top in time to welcome the front-runners and berate the stragglers.

The monument at the base is made entirely of white marble⁴, the glare from which caused serious problems for the satellite camera. Near the end of the walk there are large writings on the hillside, presumably inspirational texts to help you on the final push to the summit. There is also a longer route for those in need of additional health.

Finally, to the west of the city, where Niyazov built the largest mosque in Central Asia, partly as a memorial to the village where his mother died in the 1948 earthquake which devastated the region. The spectacular building is somewhat confusing, with quotations from both the Koran and the Ruhnama.

Niyazov died suddenly in 2006. Since then the people of Turkmenistan are seeing more freedoms, but residents of Ashgabat doubtless spend their days wondering at the folly of what was left behind.

Thanks to Birdseed, Catherine and Hamish.

There aren’t many sights that puzzle us here at Google Sightseeing, but this one has us stumped. In a remote desert area of Gansu province in northern China is this mysterious maze-like pattern.

The “streets” are about 20 metres wide, and the pattern occupies a rectangle measuring about 1km x 1.8km, aligned north to south and so sharply defined that it almost appears superimposed on the image. If you zoom in, though, you can see that the lines really are there on the ground.

Exploring the surrounding area, things get weirder. A short distance to the west are what appear to be a series of runways in various states of repair. But where are the support buildings and access roads?

At the northern end of one runway, there seem to be bomb craters. Could these be fake runways built as aerial bombardment targets? These mysterious blue-roofed buildings also seem to have been blown up.

Further west again, what’s this? Another big maze rectangle, this one looking old and faded. And just beyond… a circular arrangement of vehicles, planes and… other stuff, laid out over a 12-pointed star pattern. Another target? The plot thickens!

Frankly, we could fill a week’s worth of postings with the odd stuff on display around here. What are all these suspiciously regular shapes filling dry river beds, with signs of excavation and vehicle tracks? Could they be giant sandbags being filled and then carted off for construction work? If so there are thousands of them!

If any readers have any theories (or if anyone in the Chinese military happens to be reading!) then we’d love to know. One thing we do know, thanks to Google Earth’s historic imagery feature, is when the “maze” in our first photo was built. A photo dated April 14 2005 shows it partially completed, but by May 30 it was all finished.

Thanks to Garret.

Around 25 times a minute, 24 hours a day, this Russian shortwave radio station emits a short, monotonous buzz tone¹ on the AM frequency at 4625 kHz.

The station’s callsign is “UVB-76″, but is known amongst enthusiasts as “The Buzzer”, and the sound it transmits has been on an almost continuous loop since it was first observed in 1982.

No one knows for sure what the purpose of the signal is, and in 27 years the buzzing has only been interrupted on 3 occasions.

At 21:58 GMT on Christmas Eve 1997, 15 years after it was first observed, the buzzing abruptly stopped; to be replaced by a short series of beeps, followed by a male voice speaking Russian who repeated the following message several times:

“Ya — UVB-76. 18008. BROMAL: Boris, Roman, Olga, Mikhail, Anna, Larisa. 742, 799, 14″.

On September 12th 2002 another voice was heard, this time so distorted that only part of the message could be recognised:

“UVB-76, UVB-76. 62691 Izafet 3693 8270″.

Finally, on February 21st 2006, a third message² was transmitted which said:

“75-59-75-59. 39-52-53-58. 5-5-2-5. Konstantin-1-9-0-9-0-8-9-8-Tatiana-Oksana-Anna-Elena-Pavel-Schuka. Konstantin 8-4. 9-7-5-5-9-Tatiana. Anna Larisa Uliyana-9-4-1-4-3-4-8.”

The names used in the message are used in some Russian spelling alphabets, and although some people speculate that UVB-76 is a specialised Numbers Station, used to transmit encoded messages to spies, the messages have never been decoded, and the actual purpose of this station remains unknown.

There’s more information about the mysterious UVB-76 at WIkipedia. Thanks to Best of Wikipedia.

Remember lying on the grass when you were younger, staring up at the sky, allowing your imagination to twist and shape the clouds into an elephant being chased by a mouse or a dragon being slain by a cat? Now what if you were the clouds looking down at the earth? What would your imagination let you see then? Let’s find out.

Desert week may be over, but that doesn’t mean we can’t have a little fun in the sand. We will warn you though, you will need to pick up the phone and call the kid in you and have ‘em cover and play. You’re gonna need their help today.

Don’t guess right away; let your mind rotate the image a little. What do you see?

If you saw the lower part of a man’s face, you saw what we did. The great winds of Algeria have shaped the sand of the Issaouane Erg into a sad man’s face.

His is not the only face we found though. With a softly-curved-upwards nose and the line of the artist’s chisel surrounding the mouth, can you see the face of this little wooden girl?

There seems to be a lot of heads in the desert! Perhaps it is the hand of God doodling in the sand as we’ve found yet another one.

A westward facing goat’s head, maybe? What do you think it is?

Head’s are not the only thing to be seen in the sand though. Take a look at this shape.

The Dr. Seuss-ness of this tree stands out clearly to me. There’s no hatted cat to be seen, but let your imagination see the tree in purple and green.

All of these great sand shifted shapes come compliments of some high resolution imagery in the middle of the Saharan desert. Zooming out on this section it looks like the pockmarked face of a teenager in puberty.

Sadly, the high-res imagery is only available for a small area. The lower-res imagery surrounding the high-res rectangle looks like something you saw under the microscope in biology class. Though a contradiction in terms, we have micro-organisms in the desert.

Well, we hope you’ve enjoyed this little adventure into the sand. We’ve tried to keep it light and fun. Yes, we could have gone all serious on you and pointed out what seems to be a giant pool, enormous piece of tin foil, or a really very odd alien landmark, but every now and again isn’t it nice just to float in the clouds and gaze at the desert formations?

Okay, we’ll leave you with one more. This time we’re not going to tell you what it is though. It’s your turn. Take a look at this mystery shape, let your imagination run away with you, and leave your thoughts below.

The Darvaza (Darweze) natural gas crater is an endlessly smouldering geological anomaly located in the isolated Karakum Desert of Turkmenistan. Known locally as the “Door to Hell,” this close relative of the “Pool of Fire” and little-known tourist attraction has been on fire for at least three decades.

Above, we see the natural gas crater (barely) as a glowing red spot in an otherwise unremarkable landscape. Given the low quality of the satellite imagery in this area, it is surprising that anyone knows that the “Door to Hell” even exists. This begs the rather existential question: if a crater is burning in the middle of nowhere, does anyone see it?

As a matter of fact, a group of Russian geologists experienced it first hand in 1971¹ when the ground beneath their drilling equipment collapsed creating the abyss. Dispatched to the Karakum desert by the Soviet Union, they were searching for natural gas and found so much of the stuff that harvesting it became unsafe. With noxious gases threatening to harm nearby villages, the geologists set the seeping crater ablaze, unwittingly lighting the largest barbecue known to man.

The “Door to Hell” crater has been on fire ever since and shows no sign of stopping. Visible from a great distance, the glow from this eternal flame can even be seen in Google Earth’s City Lights layer.

Wow, that’s bright! Visitors to Turkmenistan can venture out to see hell first hand, but there aren’t any organised tours so you have to hire your own driver². Now who’s up for toasting the World’s Largest S’more?

Some really awesome photos of both craters can be found on this photography site and an impressive video of the “Door to Hell” is available on YouTube.

Thanks to Cris Diaz and Marc Buma