No matter who you might be or what your political alignment might be; is there really an American who doesn’t enjoy waving the Star-Spangled Banner? We don’t think so. One soldier did this in the most incredible way to celebrate the New Year.

U.S. Army Private First Class Alexander Caudillo isn’t exactly keen to speak about American politics. In fact, he likes to stay clear of the divisiveness we are dealing with right now. However, he is proud to be American and will do whatever it takes to defend his beloved country.

“A lot of people lose sight and get caught up in the politics and what’s going on in the country…they fail to realize this is the greatest and will continue to be the greatest country,” he said.

As a result of this sentiment, Caudillo wanted to do something that would demonstrate just how proud he really is to be an American. At the same time, he wanted the gesture to hit home how grateful he felt for his fellow soldiers who weren’t so fortunate to return home.

In an incredible moment, while he was on his way to be deployed, Caudillo got out of the car on the highway and walked the rest of the way to his base. That wasn’t all though. Caudillo carried a 60-pound backpack and listened to patriotic music as he carried the American flag all the way.

“I wanted to usher the new year in the right way,” he said. Caudillo also mentioned that he was doing this extraordinary walk for the Wounded Warrior Project. This nonprofit helps soldiers and veterans who are suffered from PTSD or were injured at war.

After growing up with the dream of serving his country, Caudillo’s dream finally came true when he became a private first class for the U.S. Army.

Soldiers will be familiar with what Caudillo was doing as it is a standard military exercise, known as a “ruck march.” “I’m carrying the flag because I’m a proud American,” he said.

Louis Armstrong was not lying — it really is a wonderful world we live in. The world is filled with strange things only deemed possible in fiction. From bubblegum lakes to offsprings of zebras and horses, there are unlikely things all over the world. We’ve found such weird and interesting things that you may have never heard of. Let’s find out more!

This photo is very special, as the likelihood of a solar eclipse happening right during sunset is quite rare. The sun here, looking like a crescent, is actually completing an eclipse right at the time of the sunset.

This looks like a scene straight out of a Star Wars movie! Solar eclipses are rare occurrences, a total eclipse may happen at the same spot only once every 360 years. What are the chances of one happening right at dusk?

This is one of the coolest innovations ever! Imagine printing out streets, literally. Path laying machines are used for block paving. It’s an alternative to typical streets that are made of asphalt. The mechanism is pretty simple.

The machine lays bricks by interlocking patterns and simultaneously lays hundreds of bricks in a short time. Launched by a Dutch company Vanku B.V., this six-meter wide device is known as the “Road Printer,” but its official name is “Tiger Stone.”

This Patek Philippe piece is the most expensive watch in the world. The internal mechanism of this watch is one of the most beautiful things ever. This is living proof of how complexity equates to beauty.

Patek Phillipe is considered to be the best watchmaker in the whole world, understandably so. Each gear is delicate and fits perfectly with the others like a puzzle piece. It’s almost like a music box in disguise, playing the sound of time.

The US-Mexican border area has an amazing part — this curvy border near Algodones Sand Dunes. This 1000-square-mile complex is the largest dune system in the US. The picture here is of the Border Patrol fence.

It was constructed in 2008 to separate the two countries, being almost 11 miles long and 15 feet high. The curvy border looks dangerous due to the way sand has been accumulating on the structure.

This looks like something the pianist Liberace would own had he been alive. It has more than 20,000 drill holes to achieve this grapevine design. Also, this happens to be the most expensive egg in the whole world!

Famous artist Franc Grom created this exquisite looking eggshell. The 70-year-old Slovenian artist excels in drill arts, which is the art of carving a structure and designing it by drilling holes.

Perfect cubes do exist in real life, all thanks to Mother Nature. These cubes are actually crystals of pyrite. This is a type of stone you will often find near an aquifer. These cubes can be almost 15 centimeters long on each side. Pyrites are sulfur ores.

If you ever see inside the crystal structure, you would notice these sulfur molecules at the center of the structure. You can find them most commonly in Navajun, Spain — exactly in this perfect square shape.

While it looks like something out of a movie, it’s real life. A sad one, that is. This picture has been taken from a fire-damaged building. In general, glass melts at 2552° to 2912° Fahrenheit. At this temperature, normal quartz melts and sublimates.

The melted glass in the picture is actually quartz. The reason it looks like this is because of the effect of cooling. It solidified instantly, just as it was melting. One thing is certain — the fire was savage.

We don’t know how to feel — this is a weird combination of creepy and upsetting. This skull is from a baby who still had her baby teeth. Adult teeth are fully formed, so you’d never see such formation in adult skulls.

Babies have milk teeth that are yet to fall out and be replaced by adult teeth. While this is an interesting fact, the photo is extremely freaky and sad.

This is the deepest pool in the world. If you’re down for scuba diving, this can be a starting point. Be careful, though, as it’s almost 148 feet deep and contains 20 times the amount of water present in a regular 25-meter pool.

It’s built as a training and practice facility for professional divers. This pool will even feel like the real ocean, as it has a simulated blue hole and Mayan ruins inside!

Abandoned trains now have a new purpose! You will find this train turned bridge in Georgia. Over the years, this has become a very popular tourist site. This is a great idea for repurposing abandoned cars.

Until now, nobody knows who did this or how this train was brought here — it’s all a big mystery. We don’t know how long this bridge will last, though, as the structure has been falling off due to corrosion. At least we have a picture to remember it by!

Sverd i fjell, or Swords in Rock, is located in the Hafrsfjord neighborhood of Rogaland county, Norway. It was designed and created by the famous sculptor Fritz and unveiled by King Olav V of Norway in 1983.

It was curated as a memorial for the Battle of Hafrsfjord in 872 A.D. Despite being a war monument, this structure is made to represent peace. Why? Notice how the swords are still connected to the ground — meaning they were never removed.

You don’t need boring math books to learn about geometry. Nature has many mathematical wonders as well. Take this cabbage, for instance. The cross-section of this cabbage is an immaculate representation of geometry in nature.

Does the pattern look similar? Well, it should. You’ll find similar patterns in many places in nature and it has a name — the Fibonacci Series. Is this enough inspiration to study math? We think so!

No, your computer screen has not been distorted. This cabinet is designed to recreate the digital distortion. While some parts of the furniture look normal, other parts are carved to create the illusion of being glitched.

It was created by an Italian designer Ferrucio Laviani for his furniture brand — Fratelli Boffi, the Good Vibrations. It was carved by a CNC machine in this way. The disorienting design of this cabinet is the main focus of this art.

Ever wondered what our feline companions see when they look up at us? Do we look like giants to them or like big cats? Below are two pictures that show just how different their vision is from ours. Cats are unable to detect all the colors humans can.

They also have trouble seeing objects that are too far away. However, their ability to see in the dark far supersedes ours, as their eyes are specialized to do so.

There are few lenticular shaped clouds, also known as UFO clouds because they’re truly shaped like a UFO spaceship. You can see them occasionally, not always. They’re more often seen in California skylines.

There are countless stories of people making them out to be UFO, but this cloud has nothing extraterrestrial about them. It’s all just science. When stable and moist air encounters a larger eddy, it tends to condense and form these lenticular clouds.

Is this where Marvel’s Thor landed on Earth? Or Lex Luthor tested the Kryptonite from Superman? It seems like both but it’s actually just due to lightning!

The lightning pattern was created as the grass burnt in the pattern of the lightning when it struck the ground. Don’t worry, though, the grass is not gone yet. The grass is already starting to grow in the burnt area, so we don’t know how long this design will stick around.

No, this is not a painting. This is a real picture of a bridge crossing an ice-cold river. The ice looks like white cheeseballs. The photo was taken either right before the spring or the end of the winter.

The temperature was not cold enough to keep all the water solid. The ice is starting to melt and formed these oval to round shapes! From this aerial point of view picture, this looks nothing like anything we’ve seen before!

Lizards. like most reptiles, shed. This process is called molting. They shed their outer skin at a specific time of the year, the duration varying with the type of lizards being considered.

The outer part left by the reptile is exquisite, to say the least. It’s like a sculpture by nature, freezing time at one point. You can see every detail of their skin and body in the shed skin.

Put aside your jam and butter. This is a loaf we cannot eat! They are, in fact, inedible. Master glassblower Loren Stump, who is based in California, has awed the internet with this art piece.

It’s made from glass. The artist carved every possible detail into these loaves, adding historical stories onto the glass. What if this loaf was edible? Perhaps we’re lucky it’s not, or havoc would ensue. It does look too pretty to eat!

This is the Gibraltar International Airport, also known as North Front Airport. It’s perhaps the riskiest and most interesting airport in the world. The History Channel featured this airport in its list of ‘Most Extreme Airports of the World.’

It’s ranked as the fifth most extreme airport and it makes perfect sense as to why. The road crossing through the runway is usually handled very cautiously. Yet, accidents have occurred many times in this airport, the most recent one in 2017.

These are the reasons you are able to read this article in the first place. Submarine communications cables are generally laid on the sea bed to carry communication signals across the ocean. They are the reason the global internet exists.

The cross-section of undersea cables looks beautiful and the mechanism behind it is pretty interesting. These are essentially fiber optics, using different material densities inside to let total internal reflection occur.

So, we’ve been paying for air all this time? Sadly, yes. This picture is great to understand how soda is made. Most of what we know as soda is only a small portion of the whole drink but it’s still the main ingredient as it’s responsible for the flavor.

Soda companies are always tight-lipped about how this formula solution is made. After getting the solution, all you have to do is add sugar, water, and compressed air!

Deceptive art at its best. The artist cleverly created the collage look by dividing the frame into four distinguished sections. And although each section has completely different elements from each other, you’ll notice there are a couple of objects that continue on to each section to create some sort of connection.

The stark contrast has given the illusion of the four frames are individual pictures. But, tt’s not a collage of different pictures! Art can be both descriptive and deceptive at the same time.

Ever wondered what happens if you slice through a plane midway? The cross-section of this airplane is a passenger compartment. Fun fact, the passenger compartment is right above where the fuel is, which is why it’s also called a fuselage.

Airplanes are manufactured in many parts. After all of the parts are developed, they are assembled together to complete the finished body of the airplane. The following photo is taken from an airplane manufacturing site.

The International Space Station is the dream destination of every astronaut. And while it’s super fascinating, it can also be quite lonely. Captured by the Space Station, this photo is of the Space Shuttle Atlantis during its launch.

Atlantis is one of the most famous and successful space shuttles of all time, having completed more than 33 missions in its 25 years of service. It landed for the final time at the Kennedy Space Center in July of 2011.

Who knew a stack of coins could look so satisfying? This picture of the stack is slightly different, almost unsettling. Notice how the coins aren’t falling to the ground even without being secured on the table? That’s foundation 101!

Each coin is stacked under one another to make a structure like this even happen. The forces of physics are holding the coins up, so that gravity can’t pull them down. It’s kind of like Jenga — and you might agree if you’ve ever played it.

This plant has seen things! Scientists assume this plant has lived for 2,000 years. Welwitschia Mirabilis is a rare plant, having an estimated life span of between 400 to 1,500 years. They grow during the summer.

This photo was taken in the Namib Desert, where the plant is still growing. The plants consist of roots, a stem base, and only two leaves. The reason behind their long life is still a big mystery.

Isn’t this the cutest animal ever? This is a picture of a quokka. They are found on the small islands off the coast of Western Australia. According to National Geographic, they are the “happiest animal in the world.”

We can thank biology for that. The bone structure of quokkas makes them appear to be smiling all the time. The only sad thing? They’re not as well known as they should be.

One fine day, a zebra and horse decided to bring to the world an adorable hybrid offspring — a zebroid. While it has black and white striped legs, the rest of the body is the same as a horse.

It looks like a horse wearing striped socks and has to be one of the cutest animals in the world. Other names for them include zonkey, zorses, and a bunch of names given by amateurs. We think ‘zebroid’ is the coolest name, though.

Pink is not a color we expect water to be! This bubblegum pink lake is actually Lake Hillier in Australia, also known as Hutt Lagoon. Don’t hop into the lake thinking it’s Candyland — you’d be severely disappointed.

The pink color is thought to be due to the excessively high amount of salt in the water. All that glitters is not gold and now we see that all that’s pink is not cute!

Stunned by the beauty of space? Well, you certainly can be, according to this fact. There’s a cloud in outer space called Sagittarius B2, containing ethyl formate. Ethyl Formate is found in many things on Earth, especially certain fruits!

This chemical also has varying effects on the human body. If you’re near this cloud, you’d certainly be slightly incoherent. Luckily, the chance of you getting near it is close to zero.

How convenient would it be to fit all your meals into one can? Well, now you can! This ordinary tin can actually contains a 12-course meal. It has cheese sourdough bread, charred strawberry with Kobe beef, and poached halibut in truffle sauce.

These posh dishes are worthy of a Michelin Star restaurant’s menu! The only catch? They are all pureed and made into jello! Christopher Godfrey made this layered goodness to show how a product can get ruined by excessive sales techniques.

Another space wonder. Outer space is the most wondrous place ever, we must say. There are things there we could only have imagined, straight out of science fiction. This picture is a drawing, but it is a drawing of a real planet.

Gliese 436b, a Neptune sized exoplanet is the most exquisite looking planet. The beauty and wonder come from it looking like it’s burning and freezing all at the same time!

This looks like a picture looks straight from an anime. Japan is home to many beautiful and peculiar things. This one is particularly beautiful, though. This is the Kawachi Fuji Garden, located in Kitakyushu, Japan.

It’s a flower tunnel and the flowers you’re seeing are a special type found in only a handful of places around the world. The wisteria flowers are pretty rare and very pretty. These are a member of the pea family, a type of ornamental vine.

These plants are called Raoulia. These weird yet beautiful shrubs produce small and white leaves. When they cover the surface, they look like these wooly stuff-almost like sheep. If you were not looking properly, you might end up feeling guilty stepping on them.

You’re most likely to come across them in New Zealand, or in some alpine areas. Many people shared how they thought it was stranded sheep but it turned out to be this plant. They are actually dubbed as “vegetable sheep.”

Centralia, Pennsylvania has one of the lowest populations in the world and it makes sense why. This town has been on fire for more than 50 years! The situation began in 1962 when someone set a fire to burn out a landfill.

The place had an old strip-mine pit. This was connected with many coal-mile tunnels. Result? An underground inferno. Since then, the town was abandoned and only a few people live there as of now.

Rafflesia is a huge sized flower. This crimson monster will look like a giant beside regular plants. It also happens to be the largest flower in the world. It’s a pretty strange flower that has no leaves, stems, or roots.

It has this eye-catching enormous center. They weigh more than 20 pounds and also happen to be one of those rare flesh-eating plants. In fact, if you go near it, you’d smell a very pungent smell of rotting meat.

When life gives you watermelons, turn them into heart-shaped melons! Japan is famous for tweaking and tricking nature and coming up with amazing creative things.

You can get a cube or heart-shaped watermelon, and these are not gimmicks — these are real fruit. They’re shaped like this while being grown. There are different shaped vegetables too and you can even request your own shapes of fruits if you like.

This looks like something out of The Wizard of Oz. It’s a real photo of a place in China. Also known as the Rainbow Mountains, located at Zhangye, Danxia Landform Geological Park.

This place is filled with a varying range of colorful sandstones and minerals. This is all naturally made, a result of minerals and sandstones being pressed together for 24 million years. Nature works in weird ways, huh?

If you ever travel to Ukraine, do visit this train tunnel in Klevan. It’s a three-mile passageway filled with leaves. The tunnel is known to many as ” The Tunnel of Love,” as it’s deemed as one of the most romantic places in the world.

The path actually follows a railroad track, the train molding the trees to grow in such ways. A train still passes through the track, so you can enjoy the site while sitting on a train, hopefully with a date.

All thanks to the wonders of science, you can now lick the wallpaper of your room. However, it’s risky if you have dogs, as chocolates are toxic for man’s best friend. Apparently, this lickable wallpaper is made for all those people who love chocolates.

Inspired by Willy Wonka & the Chocolate Factory, this delicacy disguised as wallpaper is a pretty famous party decor around the world. These are pretty affordable and available in many candy stores, especially around Halloween and Thanksgiving.

This is the biggest cave in the world and is able to fit a 40-story building. We wonder, though, are these actually the habitats of dinosaurs? Perhaps so. This is the Hang Son Doong Cave, located in Vietnam.

The cave is almost 2.5 miles long, the passageway being 300 feet wide. It can really fit a typical 40-story building in New York. It’s also dubbed as one of the most magical caves in the world and a hotspot for tourists.

Who said forests can be only horizontal? They can be vertical, too! Vertical forests are gaining popularity nowadays and this picture is from one of the latest man-made vertical forests in the world. This is known as Milan’s Bosco Verticale — the vertical forest of Milan.

It has almost 500 large and medium-sized trees, 5,000 shrubs, and more than 11,000 plants in total, all draped around 100 residential apartments. Pretty cool, huh?

No, these are not mini watermelons. These are called Camo golf balls, or more commonly called camouflage balls. These are a type of practice golf balls. Because they mimic the color combinations of gold court grass, they are called camouflage balls.

These are used to build stronger skills of predicting the trajectory — a must-have analytical ability expected of golfers. If you’re interested in golfing, try collecting these. They’re pretty cheap!

The anomalies of nature also end up being one of the most interesting things in the world. A bottlenose dolphin and a whale decided to get busy and we ended up with wholphins!

The only living hybrid of these two species is a female offspring called Kekaimalu. The good news, though, is that she gave birth to three babies with a bottlenose dolphin. The family lives in Sea Life Park, on Oahu island of Hawaii.