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You probably think that the most inaccessible places on earth are something like Area 51. And that's a good guess, but what about a stone needle sticking out of the raging ocean, where giant insects survived for over a century after we thought them extinct? Or how about a living laboratory where you're not welcome because technically speaking, you're a walking bag of germs capable of ruining the entire experiment. And there's also a rock that no human has ever set foot on, which is quite strange, because we've already sent people to the moon. But apparently, this little piece of rock in the ocean is asking for too much. Anyway, let's take a look at them. And number one is the Bols Pyramid, Australia.
Bols, or more precisely the Bols pyramid. We begin our parade of geographical absurdity with the Bols Pyramid. And yes, the name sounds exactly like that. She was named after Lieutenant Henry Litchbird Balls. No big deal, just look here. This is a 560-meter stone spike towering over the Pacific Ocean. It looks not like an ordinary island, but like a real mountain from Middle-earth, which unexpectedly rose from the depths of the ocean. So are you thinking about landing here? Well, good luck. This thing has no beaches and, of course, no harbor and zero flat landings for boats. To get on it, you have to wait for a wave near a vertical wall, and then jump onto the wet rock Tom Cruise style. If you get your
timing wrong, you'll fall into the deadly surf. For years, the Bols Pyramid was considered virtually inaccessible and completely inert, which seems entirely logical. Who would voluntarily choose to live on a wet wall in the middle of the ocean? But then in 2001, researchers climbed onto a cliff at night and found big, fat, damn gigantic insects there. These were massive, sausage-sized sticks that were nicknamed tree lobsters. I'm not kidding. This species disappeared from Lord Howe Island in the 1920s and was considered extinct for about 70 years. However, a tiny population somehow survived on one steep terrace, hiding under a small-leaved tree and feeding on its leaves. How their ancestors got to this rock remains a mystery.
This harsh volcanic outcrop has somehow miraculously become the last safe place on earth for these amazing insects. By the way, it was rats that seem to have wiped this species off the face of the earth. But in the end, this strange 562-meter wall of wet volcanic rock in the middle of nothing became their last safe haven. Number two, Bouvet Island. Norway. If you've ever felt completely alone, think about Bouvet Island. This is one of the most isolated and desolate places on earth. The nearest human settlement is almost 2,500 km away. The nearest, albeit completely uninhabited, neighbor, Antarctica, is about 1,500 km to the south. There is no airstrip here, and the journey to
Bouvet by ship can take weeks if the Southern Ocean is kind. Bouvet is essentially an ice-covered mountain in the middle of the South Atlantic. Thousands of kilometers of ocean surround it and approximately 89% of this island is buried under glacier. Steep [snorting] cliffs drop straight into the sea on almost all sides. The waters around Bouvet hide another treacherous surprise. Two wave systems can intersect at angles, creating what is called a cross sea. They are also sometimes called square waves. Older waves continue to roll, while a new wind drives the waves in a different direction. From above, the surface can resemble a giant moving chessboard. It looks beautiful, but not for sailors.
A ship is hit from two sides at the same time, and keeping a safe course becomes much, much more difficult, and the cross waves can create extremely high crests. And even if the sea allows you to get closer, there is no convenient place to moor. Usually the least terrifying option is a helicopter taking off from the ship while everyone on board hopes that the wind doesn't pick up and blow the car overboard at the most unexpected moment. In 1996, Norway installed a container weather station on the island. About 10 years later, an earthquake damaged the ground beneath it, and then a hefty winter storm finished the job. The entire station disappeared into the ocean. Bouvet Island rejected this
building. It took about 10 years of Bouvet's harsh climate and a small earthquake for not a trace of the station to remain. And there is a truly terrifying mystery here. One day, researchers found an abandoned lifeboat on the shore. No bodies, no camp, no sign of what happened to the people who arrived on it. It was just a boat standing in one of the biggest empty places on the planet. The permanent residents here are mainly penguins, seals, and seabirds. They have built-in winter coats and an ocean of food. Instead, people get biting winds, loads of ice, violent surf, and the occasional avalanche. Number three. Malpelo Island, Colombia.
Our next stop is in the Pacific Ocean. More than 500 km off the coast of Colombia, Malpelo is the summit of an underwater volcanic ridge. Forget about white sand, palm trees and cool fruit cocktails. The bare rock falls straight into deep water. There is almost no coastline and no suitable place to moor a boat. But the real spectacle is underwater. Malpelo attracts huge schools of sharks. I'm not talking about two or three stray fish swimming by. At peak times, divers can encounter hundreds of hammerhead sharks and huge schools of silky sharks. At times like these, you can look down and see sharks just about everywhere. This is not a sea full of sharks.
These are more like solid sharks with a dash of sea added. So how do people get ashore? Colombia maintains a small military observation post there, but there is nowhere to build a pier. The solution turned out to be surprisingly straightforward. They bolted a metal ladder to a rock and left it dangling over the raging Pacific waters. So here's what you do. You have to bring a small boat under the ladder while the wave throws you up and down. You have to align perfectly. Then you wait for the wave to lift your boat, grab the ladder, and hopefully start climbing at the same second before the ocean pulls the boat down again. You won't calculate the time and will plop right into
this meat grinder with sharks. This is such a ridiculously scary entrance exam. And even if you rise, Malpelo may not let you go. One day, a research group from Monaco landed for what they thought was a short visit, but the sea became angry. Too bad a storm to get back into the boat. After several futile, blood-chilling attempts, they were left to stand in the darkness, on a cold rock, under the howling wind, waiting for the mercy of the Pacific Ocean. There are worse places to get stuck, although I can't think of any right now. Number four: Surtsey, Iceland. Next comes Iceland and the island of Surtsey.
It did not exist until November 1963. There was nothing here but the cold, dark ocean. And then a volcano erupted underwater. The water began to boil, the sky turned black from volcanic ash, and a completely new piece of land emerged from the sea before the eyes of a very surprised world. It was just epic. New land, fresh real estate, time to build a hotel and sell tours. Come visit the newest island in the world. Iceland's reaction was something like this: "How dare you? Absolutely not, this area is closed, entry is prohibited." You may ask why? Well, Surtsey became an open- air biological laboratory, a
new island where scientists could watch life emerge almost from the beginning with minimal human intervention. That's why ordinary visitors go there. Only approved researchers are allowed access, and their equipment is thoroughly cleaned before they go there. Because one random seed in a shoe or one foreign spore on a jacket could contaminate this decades-long experiment. You might think this is an exaggeration, but there was a case where an explorer defecated on an island and later a tomato bush grew there.
By the way, when I say he had a bowel movement, I do n't mean he peed, but he went big. The plant waste had to be removed before this poorly planned toilet affair became part of the permanent ecosystem of Sursey. Scientists have watched as seeds arrive on the wind, birds fertilize the land, and vegetation slowly spreads where there was originally only bare rock. For the scientific community, an unauthorized tourist is not an adventurer, but rather a walking biological threat. You can admire Sursey from afar, but the ocean is steadily eroding it. The island has already lost approximately half of its original area. It rose from an eruption, became a laboratory for seabirds and scientists, and will likely
eventually sink beneath the waves again, never having known tourism. Honestly, yes, it's probably better. Number five. Iliad Queimada Grande, Brazil. When I think of Brazil, I think of beaches, hot girls, Copacabana and, unfortunately, crime. However, there is an island 30 km from São Paulo where illegal landing is a great way to get yourself into big trouble. This is the Iliad of Queimad Grandee, but is better known as Snake Island. Cool name. The problem here is not glaciers or polar storms. The problem is in the forest. The island is the only natural home for the golden spear-headed snake, the island bothrops, an
extremely venomous viper found nowhere else on earth. Rising sea levels separated the island from the mainland thousands of years ago. With few terrestrial animals to feed on, adult snakes began to rely on migratory birds. The problem is that birds easily fly away even after being bitten. Therefore, evolution favored snakes whose venom acted quickly enough to prevent their dinner from leaving the island. Effective for the snake, terrifying for virtually everyone else, especially considering that the venom can also cause serious tissue damage. According to scientific estimates, the population numbers several thousand of these deadly snakes. On an island less than half a square kilometer, this makes the issue of
personal space very difficult. At any moment, one of these deadly snakes could be right under your shoe or on a branch at face level or hidden somewhere very close by. The message is clear. Once upon a time, a lighthouse keeper lived on an island with his family. According to local legend, snakes invaded their house and after that no one showed much enthusiasm for this work anymore. The lighthouse is now automated, which seems like a very smart use of technology. The Brazilian Navy is restricting access. Special permits are issued from time to research groups, including herpetologists, that's snake experts if you're new, who have excellent, by the way,
training and, of course, nerves of steel. Everyone else is strongly advised to admire Snake Island from afar. Better leave Snake Island to the snakes. Ukraine will never give up its Snake Island to the Russians. Number six. Niihau, Hawaii, USA. Hawaii has become synonymous with mass tourism, resorts, flowers, hula dancing, and endless vacation photos. But next to this industry is Niihau. You just can't buy a ticket to go there. Eh, no geopolitical horror this time. The reason is much simpler. Private property, strict local regulations, and owners who have no desire to turn the island into another resort area. In 1864,
the family of Scottish Elizabeth Sinclair bought Niihau from the Hawaiian king for $10,000 in gold. The island later passed to her descendants, the Robinson family, and has remained privately owned ever since. There are no chain hotels here, there aren't even paved roads, and there are definitely no bus tours with armies of tourists and selfie flashes. Native Hawaiians continue to speak the Hawaiian language here and maintain a way of life that has changed much less than on neighboring islands. Limited tours exist, but visitors are kept away from the residential area. For regular access
you need an invitation. You can't just buy a ticket and wander around just because an island is on your travel bucket list. The owners just don't give a damn So even if you have a big bank account and consider yourself a big tsabe, hehe, that doesn't give you the right to hang around Niihau. The island is not waiting to be your next vacation photo. And he gets along just fine without you and your bundle or suitcase of money. Number seven. North Sentinel, India. Next we head to the Andaman Islands in the Indian Ocean. On an unchanging island, the wildlife wants you to get away. On North Sentinel,
the locals will convey this same idea to you in the most accessible way possible. You've probably seen the famous footage of islanders on the beach shooting bows at a helicopter above them. The North Sentinel are home to one of the world's most famous uncontacted indigenous communities. The Sentinelese have lived for centuries in extreme isolation and reject absolutely all outside contact. For them, the outside world is an uninteresting place, full of tourists and technology. This is a problem that continues to arrive by boat. Try to get closer and instead of bread and salt, you will receive a rain of arrows and spears. This is not an invitation to test your negotiation skills. The Indian government restricts
access to the island and surrounding waters. This rule protects outsiders, but most importantly, it protects the Sentinelese from ourselves. They probably have very weak immunity to common diseases. A visitor with the flu or measles can trigger a deadly outbreak before the community even realizes what's happening. But there will always be some idiot who is convinced that the rules don't apply to him. In 2018, American millionaire John Allen Chau illegally paid fishermen to take him to the island. He made several attempts to approach the shore with the Bible and gifts, shouting the message about Jesus. The warnings turned out to be tragically accurate.
Chau was killed by arrows. Fishermen later reported seeing Sentinelese pull his body onto the beach and bury it. Indian authorities were unable to remove him without creating even greater risk. Staying away here is not just about personal safety, it's about respecting the right of an entire people to be left alone. Looking at the modern world, it is not that difficult to understand their logic. Number eight. Mayer's Rock, Australia. And finally, the grand finale. Outsiders very rarely landed on North Sentinel Island. Someone once left a lifeboat on a buoy, but with
Mayer's Rock, things are different. There was never any landing there. Zero. Complete zero. Mayer's Rock is a volcanic spire about 150 m high near the Australian McDonald Islands. It stands squarely in the epicenter of rough weather, strong waves, powerful winds, and with rocks instead of beaches, which leaves zero room for error. We have no shortage of technology. The ocean simply offers no obvious safe route to land on its shore. A boat here can easily break against a vertical cliff, and strong, unpredictable winds make the idea of dropping a person from a helicopter a very expensive and super-dangerous adventure.
This is what makes Mayer's Rock extraordinary. We have maps, photos, satellite images, ships, helicopters and drones. The rock is not hiding, it simply stands there while the modern world watches from a respectful distance. In 2025 and 2026, Australian expeditions aboard the icebreaker RSV Nuyina returned to the McDonald Islands. The researchers used drones for aerial surveillance, but did not work on the ground at Mayer Rock. The expeditions had scientific purposes and the group of islands is protected under strict environmental regulations. So Mayer's Rock remains right there, in plain sight, photographed, mapped, surrounded by ships, and explored from the air, but it's simply never been set foot on. We know exactly
where she is. We just haven't figured out how to get a person there without doing something stupid. And that concludes our list for today. Some of these places are almost impossible to reach, some are illegal to visit, some have so many poisonous snakes that the law, frankly, doesn't matter at all. After all this, my couch, a hot cup of coffee, and a working sewer in the house are starting to look like some of humanity's greatest achievements. Leave Mayer's Rock to the seabirds, I say, and Snake Island to the snakes. We stay away, no one bothers them, and everyone wins. Write in the comments which island interested you the most.
I'm interested in reading your answers. If you liked the video, like and subscribe so you don't miss the next meeting. See you later.
