The six mind-blowing spots space tourists might explore on Mars including colossal volcanoes & black sand ‘Ghost Dunes’

MARS is home to some mind-blowing landscapes, from volcanoes five times the height of Everest to fields of so-called “ghost dunes”.

With plans for future cities on Mars already in motion, humans might just be able to explore these regions for themselves in the 2030s and beyond.

Alamy

SpaceX CEO Elon Musk has his sights set on ferrying one million people to the Red Planet by 2050[/caption]

NASA

Mount Mons is the largest volcano in our solar system, and the tallest on Mars[/caption]

Alamy

For interstellar hikers, Mount Mons will offer cracking views of the Tharsis Volcanoes[/caption]

Mount Mons

Mount Mons is the largest volcano in our solar system, and the tallest on Mars.

Standing five times the height of Earth’s Mount Everest, with a crater roughly the size of Hawaii, the volcano will be a huge landmark for both tourists and permanent residents of Mars in the future.

The volcano is 13 miles (21km) high, so it won’t be for the faint of heart.

Tharsis Volcanoes

Mount Mons is just one of a dozen large volcanoes in the Tharsis region that runs along the Martian equator.

For interstellar hikers, Mount Mons will offer cracking views of the Tharsis Volcanoes.

These volcanoes are dormant, and haven’t exploded for billions of years – posing little risk to hikers who wan’t to avoid a hot bum.

On Earth, humans regularly trek up volcanoes, like Mount Fuji in Japan, Mount Etna in Sicily and Mount Kilimanjaro in Tanzania.

Although, of course, these volcanoes tend to be much larger than those on Earth.

Nili Fossae

Once dubbed the ‘most colourful region on Mars’ by Time Magazine, images of the Nili Fossae region are truly a sight to behold.

The Nili Fossae, located on the northwest rim of Isidis impact basin, is a trough carved into the surface on Mars by a suspected impact long ago.

The area has long been considered ideal for future human, and has even been earmarked as a future landing site.

Images of the site were captured by by the High Resolution Imaging Science Experiment (HiRISE) camera on Nasa’s Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter in 2016.

While the beauty is enough to make you doubt that Mars was ever really red, the shots are infrared false-colour images.

This means the colours in the final image may not be what you expect them to be.

However, just like on the black sand beaches of Iceland, the area is thought to host basaltic terrains.

Scientists have also discovered olivine-basalt sands in the region, which can appear green and black.

So it still might be one of the more colour-diverse regions on the Red Planet.

NASA/JPL/University of Arizona

Just like on the black sand beaches of Iceland, the Nili Fossae region is thought to host basaltic terrains[/caption]

European Space Agency

At roughly 1850 miles (3000km) long, Valles Marineris makes the Grand Canyon look like a mere crack in the sand[/caption]

NASA

Melas Chasma is the widest segment of the Valles Marineris canyon system[/caption]

Valles Marineris

Alongside the largest volcano in the solar system, Mars is also home to the largest canyon.

At roughly 1850 miles (3000km) long, Valles Marineris makes the Grand Canyon look like a mere crack in the sand.

Melas Chasma is the widest segment of the Valles Marineris canyon system.

How exactly Mars earnt this giant scar baffles scientists to this day.

North Pole

Visiting either Pole will surely take your breath away – if you can survive the temperatures.

But the swirling dark spiral of ice that crowns the Martian North Pole look stunning (from afar).

Whether space tourists will want to brave the steely katabatic winds, where temperatures can sit as low as −153 °C (−243 °F), is another thing.

Ghost Dunes

Imagine staring out upon a field of hundreds of hardened casts of ancient sand dunes, and walking through their curls like waves frozen in time.

These so-called “ghost dunes” cover Mars, and researchers have discovered fields that contain more than 300 of these unique features.

They are what remains of Mars’ warmer, and more water-rich history.

While there are modern dunes on Mars, the ancient sand banks are thought to possibly hold signs of life.

European Space Agency

The swirling dark spiral of ice that crowns the Martian North Pole look stunning[/caption]

NASA

These so-called “ghost dunes” cover Mars, and researchers have discovered fields that contain more than 300 of these unique features[/caption]

NASA

They are what remains of Mars’ warmer, and more water-rich history.[/caption]

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