If you enjoy looking at a map and wondering what life is like in the places you’ve never heard of, here are ten names to look up. Some are island nations, others are territories with their own identities, and one is a mountain region whose recent history has reshaped life there.
We start with the freshwater pools of Vanuatu, cross the English Channel and the Irish Sea, and finish in the South Caucasus. How many of these places could you find on a map without searching for them?
9Nauru
Nauru is so small you can scroll past it on a map of the Pacific without noticing. The whole republic occupies a single island, with a road following the coast. Inland, decades of phosphate mining left stretches of jagged limestone.
Buada Lagoon is a quieter corner of the island, surrounded by greenery away from the coast. For such a small place, Nauru has a striking mix of landscapes: shoreline, lagoon and ground changed by mining.
