............ Wishing you a Happy New Year! .............

On April 1, Thailand Post issued a the longest stamp the world have seen, at 170 mm in length—to mark the 70th anniversary of late King Rama IX’s accession to the throne. The longest reign, the longest stamp!

                      

Mt. Chilbo | North Korea

Postcard
Mt. Chilbo in DPRK consists of many figures of rocks formed by the long time erosion of various eruptive rocks pertaining to the Paekdu Volcanic Zone.

In 2000 Mt.Chilbo was included in the UNESCO World Heritage Tentative List.

Tanna Island | Vanuatu

Postcard
Tanna is an island in Vanuatu, an archipelago country in the South Pacific. On the southeast coast the island is known for Mount Yasur, an active volcano with frequent explosions from its vents.

Thank you Steve!

Tipasa Archaeological Park | Algeria

Postcard
On the shores of the Mediterranean, Tipasa was an ancient Punic trading-post conquered by Rome and turned into a strategic base for the conquest of the kingdoms of Mauritania. Tipasa is a UNESCO World Heritage site.

Tipasa is located 70 km west of the capital Algiers. It is a serial property comprising three sites: two archaeological parks and the Royal Mauritanian Mausoleum at 11 km south-east of Tipasa.

Béguinage de Turnhout | Belgium

Postcard
Flemish Béguinages is a UNESCO World Heritage site. The Béguines were women who dedicated their lives to God without retiring from the world. In the 13th century they founded the béguinages, enclosed communities designed to meet their spiritual and material needs. The Flemish béguinages are architectural ensembles composed of houses, churches, ancillary buildings and green spaces.

The Flemish Béguinages are a series of 13 sites in the Flanders Region of Belgium. This card shows the Béguinage de Turnhout.

Flags of the World | Ecuador

Postcard
The design of the current flag of Ecuador was finalized in 1900 with the addition of the coat of arms in the center of the flag.

The design of the flag is very similar to those of Colombia and Venezuela, which are also former constituent territories of Gran Colombia. Great Colombia is a name used today for the state that encompassed much of northern South America and part of southern Central America from 1819 to 1831.

Maisons de la Weissenhof-Siedlung | Germany

Postcard
Charles-Édouard Jeanneret (1887 – 1965), known as Le Corbusier, was a Swiss-French architect, designer, painter, urban planner, writer, and one of the pioneers of what is now called modern architecture.

The Maisons de la Weissenhof-Siedlung (or Weissenhof Settlement) in Stuttgart is a housing estate built by Le Corbusier for exhibition in Stuttgart in 1927. (bottom left picture)

The Architectural Work of Le Corbusier, an Outstanding Contribution to the Modern Movement is a UNESCO World Heritage site. The site comprises 17 locations in 7 countries.

Mount Etna Fireworks | Italy

Postcard
Mount Etna is the highest Mediterranean island mountain and the most active stratovolcano in the world. The volcano is located on the east coast of Sicily, Italy.

About a million people live on Etna’s slopes, and millions more reside on the coastlines across the Ionian sea. If part of the volcano near the shoreline becomes unstable and falls into the water, it could create mega-tsunamis that would devastate the shores of the eastern Mediterranean.

Mount Etna is a UNESCO World Heritage site.

Caliphate City of Medina Azahara | Spain

Postcard
Medina Azahara is the ruins of a vast, fortified Moorish medieval palace-city built by Abd-ar-Rahman III (912–961), the first Umayyad Caliph of Córdoba. After prospering for several years, it was destryed during the civil war that put an end to the Caliphate in 1009-1010. The remains of the city were forgotten for almost 1,000 years until their rediscovery in the early 20th century.

Caliphate City of Medina Azahara is a UNESCO World Heritage site.

Lake Assal | Djibouti

Postcard
Lake Assal is a crater lake in central Djibouti. The salinity level of its waters is 10 times that of the sea, making it on of the most saline in the world. No outflow occurs from the lake, and due to high evaporation the lake is extremely saline.

Le Lac Assal is on the tentative list of UNESCO World Heritage sites.

Dakhla | Western Sahara

Postcard
This postcard has been sent from Dakhla, a city in Western Sahara, a disputed territory currently administered by Morocco. The city is located on a narrow peninsula of the Atlantic Coast.

Dakhla was occupied by Spain from the late 19th century until 1975, when power was then relinquished to a joint administration between Morocco and Mauritania. There was a United Nations-sponsored ceasefire in 1991, but as recently as 2006, the majority of UN member states have refused to recognise Moroccan sovereignty in the area.

Flags of the World | Liberia

Postcard
Liberia means "land of the free" and refers to the nation's origin as a colony of freed African-American and Caribbean / West Indies slaves, repatriated to Africa in the early nineteenth century.

The flag of Liberia bears a close resemblance to the flag of the United States, showing the freed American and ex-Caribbean slaves offspring and bloodline origins of the country.

Indrija mercury mine | Slovenia

Postcard
Idrija is a town in western Slovenia, known for its mercury mine, the second largest in the world.

Together with the mining sites of Almadén in Spain it comprises UNESCO World Heritage site Heritage of Mercury. Almadén and Idrija.

Chinguetti | Mauritania

Postcard
Chinguetti is a ksar or a Berber medieval trading center in northern Mauritania. Founded in the 11th and 12th centuries to serve the caravans crossing the Sahara, these trading and religious centres became focal points of Islamic culture.

Ancient Ksour of Ouadane, Chinguetti, Tichitt and Oualata is a UNESCO World Heritage site.

Ancient City of Qalhat | Oman

Postcard
Ancient City of Qalhat is a UNESCO World Heritage site. The property, which is located on the east coast of the Sultanate of Oman, includes the ancient city of Qalhat, surrounded by inner and outer walls, as well as areas beyond the ramparts where necropolises are located.

Persepolis | Iran

Postcard
Persepolis, meaning "city of Persians", Persepolis was an ancient ceremonial capital of the second Iranian dynasty, the Achaemenid Empire. The earliest remains of Persepolis date from around 515 BC.

The Gate of All Nations (or the Gate of Xerxes), is located in the ruins of this ancient city.
The construction was ordered by the Achaemenid king Xerxes I (486-465 BC).

Persepolis is a UNESCO World Heritage site.

Kangaroo Island | Australia

Postcard
Kangaroo Island is Australia's third-largest island, after Tasmania and Melville Island. The island is located about 13km off the coast near Adelaide. It is known for its spectacular landscapes and amazing diversity of wildlife. So you will find not only kangaroos.

Remarkable rocks are one of the signature landmarks on the island. It took millions of years for rain, wind, and pounding waves to create these granite boulders which are now part of the Flinders Chase National Park. Here and here you see two other cards about this island.

Thx Steve!

Flags of the World | Albania

Postcard
The flag was established as the national flag of Albania when the country gained its independence from the Ottoman empire in 1912. The eagle was used for heraldic purposes in the Middle Ages by a number of noble families in Albania and became the symbol of the Albanians.

The Kastrioti's family coat of arms, depicting a black double-headed eagle on a red field, became famous when he led a revolt against the Ottoman Empire resulting in the independence of Albania from 1443 to 1479.

AL-Hammar Marshes | Iraq

Postcard
The Ahwar of Southern Iraq – also known as the Iraqi Marshlands – are unique, as one of the world’s largest inland delta systems, in an extremely hot and arid environment.

The Ahwar of Southern Iraq: Refuge of Biodiversity and the Relict Landscape of the Mesopotamian Cities is a UNESCO World Heritage site. The Ahwar is made up of seven components: three archaeological sites and four wetland marsh areas in southern Iraq.

Valley of Flowers National Park | India

Postcard
India’s Valley of Flowers National Park is renowned for its meadows of endemic alpine flowers and outstanding natural beauty. This richly diverse area is also home to rare and endangered animals, including the Asiatic black bear, snow leopard, brown bear and blue sheep.

The park is part of Nanda Devi and Valley of Flowers National Parks, a Unesco World Heritage site.

Fortified city of Palmanova | Italy

Postcard
The Fortified city of Palmanova is part of the UNESCO World Heritage site "Venetian Works of Defence between the 16th and 17th Centuries: Stato da Terra – Western Stato da Mar".

This property consists of 6 components of defence works in Italy, Croatia and Montenegro, spanning more than 1,000 km between the Lombard region of Italy and the eastern Adriatic Coast.

The three fortified cities in Italy are:
- Fortified city of Bergamo
- Fortified city of Peschiera del Garda
- City Fortress of Palmanova

Chengjiang Fossil Site | China

Postcard
The Chengjiang Fossil Site, located in the Province of Yunnan, China, conserves fossil remains which are, according to UNESCO, of exceptional significance. 

Chengjiang Fossil Site is a UNESCO World Heritage site.

Primosten Island | Croatia

Postcard
Primosten is a small town located between Sibenik and Split in Croatia. The old town is situated on a small island which is connected with the mainland.

In the past it was an island protected by stone walls and towers and in the 16th century a movable bridge was built that connected this village with the mainland. Later the bridge was replaced by an embankment and Primosten thus becomes a peninsula.

Dancing on the beach | Vanuatu

Postcard
Vanuatu is a Pacific island country located in the South Pacific Ocean. The archipelago, which is of volcanic origin, is located in the middle of northern Australia, New Caledonia, New Guinea, the Solomon Islands and Fiji.

thx Steve and Lyndy for this great surprise!

Banzai Cliff | Northern Mariana Islands

Postcard
The Northern Mariana Islands is a commonwealth of the United States consisting of 14 islands in the northwestern Pacific Ocean. The main islands are Saipan, Tinian, and Rota where the vast majority of the 50,000 inhabitants live.

Banzai Cliff is a historic site at the northern tip of Saipan island. Towards the end of the Battle of Saipan in 1944, hundreds of Japanese civilians and soldiers jumped off the cliff to their deaths in the ocean and rocks below, to avoid being captured by the Americans. Hence its name.

Thx for organizing this card Sayam! Its off the list of missing countries and territories now.