It is one of the world’s most visited and beloved religious venues – the Basilica of Our Lady of Guadalupe, with a circular, tent-shaped roof visible from miles away and a sacred history that each year draws millions of pilgrims from near and far to its hilltop site in Mexico City. Early December is the busiest time, as pilgrims converge ahead of Dec. 12, the feast day honoring Our Lady of Guadalupe. To Catholic believers, the date is the anniversary of one of several apparitions of the Virgin Mary witnessed by an Indigenous Mexican man named Juan Diego in 1531. The COVID-19 pandemic curtailed the number of pilgrims in 2020. Last year, even with some restrictions still in place, attendance for the December celebrations rose to at least 3.5 million, according to local officials. Bigg...
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travel articles and news about countries and destinations in North America
Scientists discovered the oldest known DNA and used it to reveal what life was like 2 million years ago in the northern tip of Greenland. Today, it’s a barren Arctic desert, but back then it was a lush landscape of trees and vegetation with an array of animals, even the now extinct mastodon. “The study opens the door into a past that has basically been lost,” said lead author Kurt Kjær, a geologist and glacier expert at the University of Copenhagen. This illustration provided by researchers depicts Kap Kobenhavn, Greenland, two million years ago, when the temperature was significantly warmer than northernmost Greenland today. (Beth Zaiken via AP) With animal fossils hard to come by, the researchers extracted environmental DNA, also known as eDNA, from soil samples. This is the ge...
Read MoreThough the weather outside was frightful, schoolchildren in the northern Alaska Inupiac community of Nuiqsut were so delighted for a visit by Santa that they braved wind chills of 25 degrees below zero just to see him land on a snow-covered airstrip. Once again, it was time for Operation Santa Claus in Alaska. And here in Nuiqsut, a roadless village of about 460 residents on Alaska’s oil-rich North Slope, the temperatures may have been plunging but the children were warming quickly. Never mind that Santa left Rudolph at home to catch a ride on an Alaska Air National Guard cargo plane to Nuiqsut, just 30 frosty miles (50 kilometers) south of the Arctic Ocean. Here, just a reindeer skip and a hop from the North Pole, the students were abuzz with good cheer. Helpers in the Alaska Na...
Read MoreSevere beach erosion from two late-season hurricanes has helped uncover what appears to be a wooden ship dating from the 1800s which had been buried under the sand on Florida’s East Coast for up to two centuries, impervious to cars that drove daily on the beach or sand castles built by generations of tourists. Beachgoers and lifeguards discovered the wooden structure, between 80 feet to 100 feet (24 meters to 30.5 meters), poking out of the sand over Thanksgiving weekend in front of homes which collapsed into rubble on Daytona Beach Shores last month from Hurricane Nicole, Members of a team of archaeologists study a wooden structure in the sand, Tuesday, Dec. 6, 2022, in Daytona Beach, Fla. (AP Photo/John Raoux) “Whenever you find a shipwreck on the beach it’s really an amazing o...
Read MoreFrom a distance, they appear like autumn foliage: millions of endangered monarch butterflies blanketing trees in a kaleidoscope of brown, orange and black. As the crisp mountain air warms, they flutter above dazzled visitors who have come to see an annual tradition that persists despite the environmental and human pressures threatening it. Monarch butterflies fly at the Sierra Chincua butterfly sanctuary in Angangeo, Michoacan state, Mexico. December 3, 2022 REUTERS/Raquel Cunha Every year, migratory monarchs travel up to 2,000 miles (3,000 km) from the eastern United States and Canada to spend the winter among the forests of central and western Mexico. Winter weekends bring hundreds of visitors to Sierra Chincua, an idyllic monarch sanctuary in the western state of Michoacan,...
Read MoreMany people on the Big Island of Hawaii are bracing for major upheaval if lava from Mauna Loa volcano slides across a key highway and blocks the quickest route connecting two sides of the island. The molten rock could make the road impassable and force drivers to find alternate coastal routes in the north and south. That could add hours to commute times, doctor’s visits and freight truck deliveries. “I am very nervous about it being cut off,” said Frank Manley, a licensed practical nurse whose commute is already an hour and 45 minutes each way from his home in Hilo to a Kaiser Permanente clinic in Kailua-Kona. Lava fountains and flows illuminate the area with a glow at the Mauna Loa volcano eruption in Hawaii, U.S. December 2, 2022. REUTERS/Go Nakamura If the highway closes, h...
Read MoreLying on a shady patch of grass under the hot Mexico sun, Zazil, a female spotted jaguar stretches her limbs. Born in captivity, she is a top candidate to help boost wild populations of this magnificent, endangered species. Reino Animal, a sprawling animal conservation park some 56 kilometres (35 miles) northeast from Mexico City, plans to move one of their female jaguars and her future cubs to its new facility next spring. A jaguar is seen at the jaguar sanctuary inside of Reino Animal Conservation Park, in Oxtotipac, State of Mexico, Mexico, November 2022. Reino Animal/ Handout via REUTERS After two years without human interaction, it plans to release the cubs into the wild. Animals bred in captivity in contact with humans or those rescued from the exotic pet trade cannot be se...
Read MoreThe world’s largest volcano oozed rivers of glowing lava Wednesday, drawing thousands of awestruck viewers who jammed a Hawaii highway that could soon be covered by the flow. Mauna Loa awoke from its 38-year slumber Sunday, causing volcanic ash and debris to drift down from the sky. A main highway linking towns on the east and west coasts of the Big Island became an impromptu viewing point, with thousands of cars jamming the highway near Volcanoes National Park. People pose for a photo in front of lava erupting from Hawaii's Mauna Loa volcano Wednesday, Nov. 30, 2022, near Hilo, Hawaii. (AP Photo/Gregory Bull) Anne Andersen left her overnight shift as a nurse to see the spectacle Wednesday, afraid that the road would soon be closed. “It’s Mother Nature showing us her face,” sh...
Read MoreHawaii's Mauna Loa, the world's largest active volcano, began erupting on Sunday for the first time since 1984, ending its longest quiet period in recorded history. The night sky above Hawaii's largest island glowed a hellish red as bright, hot lava sprang forth at the volcano's summit at around 11:30 p.m. local time on Sunday (0930 GMT Monday). Lava is seen at Mauna Loa's summit region during an eruption as viewed by a remote camera of the U.S. Geological Survey in Hawaii, U.S. November 28, 2022. USGS/Handout via REUTERS The lava is contained within the summit and does not threaten Hawaiians living downslope for now, the U.S. Geological Service (USGS) said. The service warned residents on Monday that volcanic gases and fine ash may drift their way. The eruption began late Sunday...
Read MorePerched atop a fence at Badlands National Park, Troy Heinert peered from beneath his wide-brimmed hat into a corral where 100 wild bison awaited transfer to the Rosebud Indian Reservation. Descendants of bison that once roamed North America’s Great Plains by the tens of millions, the animals would soon thunder up a chute, take a truck ride across South Dakota and join one of many burgeoning herds Heinert has helped reestablish on Native American lands. Heinert nodded in satisfaction to a park service employee as the animals stomped their hooves and kicked up dust in the cold wind. He took a brief call from Iowa about another herd being transferred to tribes in Minnesota and Oklahoma, then spoke with a fellow trucker about yet more bison destined for Wisconsin. Bison, also known a...
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