These award-winning photos show our planet at its most beautiful 

The natural world is a stunning place.

Every year, the best landscape photography shows off Earth's beauty. The following photos are some of the winners from the 2017 International Landscape Photographer of the Year contest.

They highlight powerful mountains, scenes of isolation, worlds of color and light, and the abstract loveliness found in landscapes all over the world. Winning photos were shot in the wilds of Patagonia, the mountains of Iceland, and in the desert-surrounded lakes of Brazil.

They show the world in ways that will make you want to get up, pack a bag, and go exploring.

Cristiano Xavier of Brazil won the aerial photography award with this stunner from the Lençóis Maranhenses in northeastern Brazil.

Brazilian photographer Marcio Cabral won the long-exposure award for this galaxy-revealing shot from Veadeiros National Park in Brazil.

Huibo Hou, who's based in San Diego, won third in the "Photographer of the Year" competition. Here, she shows the otherworldly Bisti Wilderness Area of New Mexico.

Solitude and silence come through in Hou's black and white images. Pictured is Yellowstone National Park in winter.

The park is blanketed in snow and silence in this shot by Hou.

And there's a sense of isolation in this stark image, which is also from Yellowstone.

Alex Nail of the UK took the mountain award for this photo of the Southern Highlands in Iceland.

Romanian photographer Cosmin Stan won the snow award for this windy shot from Ciucas Mountains National Park in Romania.

Canadian Adam Gibbs came in second place in the "Photographer of the Year" competition. This is Watersprite Lake in Squamish, British Columbia.

With this ethereal image, Gibbs shows off Fairy Lake at Port Renfrew on Vancouver Island in British Columbia.

Gibbs also captured this natural bridge in Yoho National Park in British Columbia.

And here, he shows the spectacular view from above the clouds in Mt. Seymour Provincial Park in British Columbia.

Hong Kong-based photographer Stephen King won the tree award with this haunting image from Ace Hill at Hirafu Village in Hokkaido, Japan.

Max Rive of the Netherlands won the "International Landscape Photographer of the Year" award for his body of work, which includes photos from New Zealand, Patagonia (shown here), and other locations.

Rive started taking photos in 2008 and has only been a professional for the past three years. Here he shows Monte Fitz Roy in Argentina.

This image by Rive, taken on the Argentinian side of Patagonia also won the individual "Photograph of the Year" competition. It shows Cerro Torre in the background.

Rive's perspectives of the spectacular Swiss Alps are also stunning.