These laurels are hardy Oct 19, 2021

These laurels are hardy

Go back 15 million years and you"d find most of Southern Europe looking like this fantasy forest: thick, scrubby underbrush canopied by wizened laurel trees. An epoch or two of human agricultural advances cleared those ancient woods, but patches persist on a few temperate Atlantic islands—especially here on Madeira, a Portuguese-held island off northwest Africa.

© Val Thoermer/Alamy

palette

Today in History

Oct 19, 2018Portland celebrates its bounty
Oct 19, 2020A cliff-hanging complex of temples
Oct 19, 2022Wartburg Castle overlooking Thuringian Forest in Germany
Oct 19, 2023Mekong River Delta, Long An, Vietnam
Oct 19, 2024International Archaeology Day
Oct 19, 2025Apples ready for harvest in Minnesota

More Desktop Wallpapers:

Nov 16, 2025A traboule in Lyon, France
Feb 29, 2024Leap day
Feb 7, 2020Frozen fun in the Canadian cold
May 25, 2024Aït Benhaddou, Morocco
Mar 17, 2018Happy St. Patrick’s Day!
Jan 31, 2022Incense making, Vietnam
Sep 24, 2023World Rivers Day
Apr 11, 2021The mountain of 30,000 sakura
Aug 31, 2025Scotts Bluff National Monument, Gering, Nebraska
Jan 30, 2024Aýna, Albacete, Spain
Jan 24, 2019Lights, camera, Sundance
Sep 10, 2025Hay bales in North Yorkshire, England
May 14, 2019Cannes, France, in the spotlight
Oct 22, 2025The Belogradchik Rocks in Bulgaria
Mar 12, 2018It’s Napping Day
Sep 20, 2024Ocracoke Lighthouse on Ocracoke Island, North Carolina
May 30, 2023Playa del Amor, Marietas Islands, Mexico
Apr 18, 2019Stop and see the flowers
Nov 21, 20222022 FIFA World Cup
Nov 13, 2025Quiver trees, Keetmanshoop, Namibia
Nov 15, 2018‘Ocian in view! O! The joy.’
Nov 11, 2018Poppies for Armistice Day
Dec 30, 2018Adorably evolutionary sea sheep
Mar 19, 2019The smoke before the bonfire
Dec 17, 2021Bournemouth beach huts
Jan 25, 2025Porto, Portugal
Feb 10, 2022The Old City of Bern
May 16, 2024International Day of Light
Mar 15, 2018The Colosseum of Rome, Italy
Apr 29, 2019New beginnings