Trona Pinnacles: A Mesmerizing Lunar Landscape with "Cacti" That Became Movie Characters (15 photos)

In the middle of California's Mojave Desert, at the bottom of the dry Searles Lake, lies a fantastical landscape—Trona Pinnacles.





More than 500 strangely shaped towers, resembling giant cacti, fossilized corals, or the ruins of an alien city, rise above a flat, cracked clay plain.



This is not the work of a sculptor, but the work of ancient water and chemistry. These formations are composed of calcium carbonate, known as tuff. They formed underwater 10,000 to 100,000 years ago, when a vast lake swam here. Calcium-rich springs mixed with the alkaline lake water, and these stone "stalagmites" slowly grew on the bottom. The tallest of them reach 40 meters—the height of a 12-story building.





Over time, the lake evaporated, revealing a surreal "fleet" of stone peaks, divided into three groups of varying ages. Their otherworldly aesthetic has not gone unnoticed by Hollywood.



This is where desert planet scenes were filmed for iconic films, including Star Trek V: The Final Frontier and the new Planet of the Apes trilogy. This location is the perfect backdrop for an apocalypse or a distant galaxy, created by nature itself millions of years ago.





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