Am I hallucinating or are these boats really flying?
Learn what weird optical phenomenon can occur when the ground is very hot and the air is cool. Epic!
Think about some cool westerns in which a cowboy walks during hours, without water in a hot desert. Yes, you got it? We are here talking about air mirages, an amazing and sometimes awesome natural optical phenomenon.
A wonderful image of Königsee in Germany taken just after dawn.
The natural illusion I am reporting here did not occur in any deserts but during a sunny and very warm autumn day on a wonderful alpine Lake, the Königsee, which is at this time of the year very cold. Pictures were all done by Claudia and Wolfgang Hinz and show how Nature and our Earth are amazing.
The fast changing optical phenomenon transformed the lake into an alien landscape.
Ships start flying over the water.
Islands float in the air.
And aliens are being hunt over the lake.
Even St. Batholomä Church, a large touristic attraction of the lake was drifting on the surface water giving this sanctuary place more magic.
Look at the forest spirit, he was there for a short visit.
Luckily, they also witnessed the lake’s crocodile trying to catch a metalic bird!
How do mirages form?
Mirages can form when the hot ground warms a layer of air just above the ground. As light travels at different speeds through hot air and cold air, the light is bent or better said refracted when passing from the cold air into the hot air.
Coming back to our cowboys
After hours of walk, dehydrated, they often see on the horizon a shimmering puddle of water and think they are saved. However, arriving at this puddle of water, they just figure out that nothing is there, that their vision was actually a mirage. But lucky enough, most of these cowboys are then saved by careful and wonderful American Indian women.
[…] a kind of mirage, […]