Rabaul, a settlement in the East of magic exotic Papua New Guinea, has literally one of the hottest chronicles worldwide. On the one hand the equatorial sun is frying everything at temperatures around 30°C and air moisture of ~90%, on the other hand during World War II. Rabaul was caught in the middle when Japanese and US Americans were battling against each other and for dominance in the Pacific Ocean. That’s only the most recent history though. The biggest imminence was and still is the forces of nature as within living memory they ever emerged at that remote spot of our planet. In particular the eastern end of New Britain Island is at the mercy of volcanism and tectonics; there Earth’s most powerful forces are clashing at top speed and get all too often fully unleashed. Earthquakes are a daily occurrence and being powered by a magma chamber located only 3 to 4 kilometres deep, even two fire mountains – Vulcan Crater and the pretty explosive beast of Tavurvur – are letting off their infernal steam. Although this sounds like hell on Earth life, nature and humans are always coming back to this place and in particular wildlife under water could develop to worldwide unique undersea beauty »»

The islands of Palau are an archipelago being located some 1500km to the east of the Philippines. Several thousand years ago a tectonic uplifting process elevated its 356 islands literally to the second storey making them now looking like as if a sloppy painter was at work somewhere amidst the turquoise waters of the Pacific Ocean and left dozens of green patches behind. The rock islands of Palau are forming a large lagoon housing a worldwide unique variety of submarine life. Doesn’t matter if going below the waterline by snorkel or scuba, unavoidably you’ll become eyewitness of toilet sized giant clams, sharks en masse and countless fish being painted in all possible colours. Palau’s most amazing miracle of nature is a small stand-alone pond full of thousands of golden jellyfish drifting around in time with the shining sun at the Jellyfish Lake »»