Geographical facts that surprise you (calculated, kitchen, Croatian)

[The Postman]

Originally Posted by Joe90

New Zealand is closer to New Caledonia, than mainland Australia.

What's more surprising is New Caledonia is closer to Australia than NZ is.

[jtur88]

The two longest rivers in the world whose drainage basin is entirely within one country are both in China.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_rivers_by_length

The longest river in North America is the Big Hole River, which flows into the Jefferson, which flows into the Missouri, and then into the Mississippi.

https://maps.google.com/maps?q=Wisdo...250.02,,0,-1.1

[pch1013]

Conversely, the river that touches more countries than any other (10) is the Danube. And its drainage basin includes parts of 9 more.

Countries of the Danube River Basin | ICPDR - International Commission for the Protection of the Danube River

[jtur88]

According to that ^^^, every drop of rainwater that falls in Hungary eventually flows into one river. I wonder how many other countries can say that? I think Paraguay (Paraguay) and Laos (Mekong), for starters.

[Qilin34]

In January 2013, Mount Washington (NH, U.S.) went from a monthly record high of 48F/9C down to the monthly record cold daily maximum (and the second-coldest daily max on record there): −26F/−32C.

Later that year, in May, Sioux City, IA recorded its only May snowfall and its monthly record high of 106F/41C: Dr. Jeff Masters' WunderBlog : Extreme Weather Whiplash: 106° in Iowa on the Heels of Record May Snows | Weather Underground

[Canberraboy]

Canberra, Australia is the Coldest Capital City in the Southern Hemisphere even though we are only 580m above Sea level.

We are colder than Wellington NZ, Sucre Bolivia, Quito Ecuador.

We have daily July averages of 5.2 deg Celsius and we often get -5 to -8 Deg overnight in July.

[strad]

Originally Posted by green_mariner

Ã…, located in Sweden and Norway, is the world's shortest place name.

That's not really true. It may be _one of_ the shortest, but there is a rive in Oregon called "D", and there are a ton of places in China with a single character name.

[Qilin34]

Originally Posted by strad

That's not really true. It may be _one of_ the shortest, but there is a rive in Oregon called "D", and there are a ton of places in China with a single character name.

That is, if you leave out the settlement-type designation (example is Mang, Yunnan. Even if you do, when converted to pinyin it's two letters at the minimum and I only know of one such example in exurban Shanghai.

[jtur88]

Originally Posted by green_mariner

Actually: Mawsynram - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Mawsynram is the wettest place on earth, with 467 inches of rain per year.

Actually, I've been there. Not exactly in Mawsynram, but I stayed for three days in Shillong, 40 km away, at the beginning of the Monsoon season, and it never rained once. We saw the first monsoon rain about a week earlier at Kaziranga.

[The Postman]

Originally Posted by jtur88

Actually, I've been there. Not exactly in Mawsynram, but I stayed for three days in Shillong, 40 km away, at the beginning of the Monsoon season, and it never rained once. We saw the first monsoon rain about a week earlier at Kaziranga.

Yes, yet for part of the year it's rainless.

I'd say Mt Waialeale in Hawaii is probably 'wetter' in the real sense:

Mount Waialeale - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

It gets more consistent rain, is drenched all through the year, and averages an incredible 360 days of rain a year! ...it's actual average total is only slightly lower than those places in India too.